Shadow the Hedgehog
by Babylon Sky Hawk
Summary: complete. After the battle on the ARK, Shadow questions his existence. But when an alien says he knows the truth about him, Shadow must decide between his origins or his friends
1. Who Am I?

**SHADOW THE HEDGEHOG**

Disclaimer: I do not own the Sonic characters, just the OC's

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Chapter one: Who Am I?

Over a month has passed since Sonic and Shadow united their powers to defeat the Final Hazard on the ARK. Ever since that day, Sonic has been traveling the world, but it wasn't for fun like it usually was. After the battle on the ARK, Kumori had revealed the truth to Sonic and that Amy was still alive somewhere on Earth. Ever since then, Sonic has been running across the globe, hoping to find her. But this story is not about Sonic.

In the far city of Westopolis, Shadow stands on a hill just outside the city. Things weren't right with him and his memories. His mind was abuzz with the confusion of determining which of his memories was real and which were lies. He also was curious about the differences between him and his prototypes, Kumori and the Biolizard.

Then, the wind blew by with a newspaper being carried by it. As the newspaper was about to pass him, his eyes caught a particular article and quickly grabbed it before it got too far away for him to reach. 'Fire-in-the-sky Celebration, 50 Year return of Black Comet!' he read from the paper out loud. "Black Comet, that name seems familiar somehow, probably nothing." Shadow thought as he allowed the paper to be taken by the wind once more.

"My mind so very confused, now more then ever. I am slowly forgetting everything I once knew about my past. I can hardly remember anything that happened over 50 years ago, except for those times with Kumori and Maria." Shadow thought. He smiled as he remembered the times he would spend with Kumori and Maria, just watching the planet below them.

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_---Flashback---_

Shadow watched the Earth as Kumori taught him everything she knew about it, that she learned from Maria. "Maria told me that the Earth is made up of mostly water and that when the sun sets over the horizon, the sky is filled with a beautiful array of colors." Kumori told him. "Wow, Maria is lucky to have lived on such a planet." Shadow said. "yeah, maybe we'll visit there someday." Kumori said hopeful "Don't count on it." Shadow said

Just then Maria walked in. "Don't say that shadow, I'm sure you'll go there someday." Maria said to him. "According to Professor Gerald, that won't happen anytime soon. The government is afraid of us and they will try to kill us." Shadow explained. "But that doesn't mean you have to stop dreaming, does it?" Maria asked. "No, I guess not." Shadow said.

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"Maria. She was always a dreamer." Shadow thought. Shadow looked to the city in front of him and thought how much Maria would have wanted to visit the planet she loved so much. Shadow knew that the reason Maria had been sent to the ARK was because of her illness and could not travel to Earth, for her grandfather thought she would die if she did. "It didn't matter. In the end she died anyway." Shadow thought as he remembered how she was killed by the G.U.N. soldiers after sending Shadow and Kumori to Earth. 

Another thing that was bothering him was about him and his prototypes. Sure, they were created by the same person for the same reason, but Shadow was different then the other two. The first prototype created by Professor Gerald was the Biolizard. The most obvious difference between the two was the fact that it was a huge lizard monster and he was a small speedy hedgehog. Unlike Shadow, the Biolizard used a life-support system to survive, but it could use the power of the chaos emeralds like him.

The next prototype was Kumori. Kumori was the closest experiment to Shadow in many ways. First off, she was a hedgehog like him, had super speed like him, and had eternal youth like Shadow as well. But despite the similarities, Kumori was different because she couldn't use chaos magic like Shadow or the Biolizard. "I don't understand. Why am I different from the other two? Just what exactly is the truth of my origin?" Shadow asked himself.

As Shadow pondered these questions, blood red clouds began to form over the city of Westopolis. The clouds open themselves up and an amazingly large amount of black demonic aliens fell from them. When the aliens first landed on to the ground, they started to destroy everything in sight without even showing the slightest bit of hesitation.

Shadow watched as the alien were destroying the city and not planning on letting them continue their rampage. "If those alien freaks think they can come destroy my planet, my home, then they got another thing coming." Shadow proclaimed. Shadow was about to run into the city and eliminate the alien invaders until his ears caught the sound of a demonic bone-chilling voice. "Shadow…"

Shadow looked behind him and saw black-purple octopus like-alien with a large, bright red eye floated towards him. The alien stopped and its eye glowed to show a hologram of, what Shadow thought, was the alien leader. The leader was a floating black, three-eyed alien with two red horizontal horns. He wore a brown and golden robe with a chain around his neck and various jewels all around his robe. The figure looked to Shadow and seemed somewhat pleased by his arrival.

"As you can see, the day of reckoning will soon be here. Find the seven Chaos Emeralds, and bring them to me - as promised, Shadow." The alien said to Shadow. Shadow was shocked and confused at how the alien leader knew his name and wanted him to bring him the most powerful items in the entire world. "Alright, who are you and give me one good reason why I should do what you say!" Shadow shouted. The alien leader looked at Shadow strangely, thinking he was joking. But he wasn't.

"I am Black Doom, leader of the Black Arms." Black Doom stated. "The Black Arms?" Shadow questioned. "And I do happen to have a good reason for you to obey me." Black Doom told him. "Oh yeah, What?!" Shadow asked with anger. "You wish to know the truth about you origins, do you not? Find and bring me the seven chaos emeralds and I will tell you everything you want to know." Black Doom offered. Shadow shocked to learn that this black monstrosity could hold the answers to the very questions he wanted answered.

Shadow was about to ask Black Doom how he knew anything about him, but was unable to as the hologram disappeared and the eye floated away. He was ready to chase it until a few random explosions caused him to lose his balance. Shadow got back on his feet with a look of determination in his eyes. "He knows something about my origins, then like it or not, I have to do what he says. That means I must find the seven chaos emeralds!" Shadow said. Shadow ran off into the destroyed city to begin his hunt the emeralds and his secrets.

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	2. Westopolis

**SHADOW THE HEDGEHOG**

Disclaimer: I do not own the Sonic characters, just the OC's

Chapter Two: Westopolis

The black aliens or as Black Doom calls them, the Black Arms, were rampaging around the helpless city of Westopolis, with very few people protecting it. G.U.N. soldiers were stationed at many points of the city, but did not have enough men or fire power to destroy the invaders. On one of the wrecked buildings, Shadow watched as the struggle for survival continued. "I don't know which of them to side with. I made a promise to Maria, but Black Doom knows about my origins. I must make a decision here." Shadow said as he fell of the ledge of the building.

When Shadow had reached the ground, he saw a G.U.N. soldier shooting at winged black alien. Shadow still hadn't decided which side to join and watched the two battle until a large blue laser came from out of nowhere and killed them both. Shadow walked up to the dead G.U.N. soldier and looked as his body had been completely burned by the laser. Shadow then heard the sound of fast moving footsteps coming from behind and already knew who it was. Shadow looked back to see that his answer was correct, it was Sonic the Hedgehog.

"Hey Shadow, long time no see." Sonic said to his dark counterpart. "Sonic? I thought you were looking for Amy." Shadow said. "I was looking for her in this city when these black creatures attacked. I could really use your help to get rid of them." Sonic said to him. Shadow gave no reply because he hasn't decided which side he was on. Instead, he just ran in the direction of the fighting and Sonic thought Shadow was helping him.

They ran down a hillside to find three G.U.N. soldiers being killed by a single black alien. "Come on Shadow, we got to help them." Sonic said. Defeating the black alien was simple, all Sonic had to do was use a single homing attack and the creature was down. "Ha, that was easy." Sonic said. Sonic noticed that Shadow did not help him, but instead walked past him to a glass box. Shadow thrust his hand through the glass and pulled out a green chaos emerald. "Alright a chaos emerald, that is sure to help us defeat these black creatures." Sonic said.

Then, Black Doom's alien squid, or Doom's Eye, slithered through the air and stopped in front of Sonic and Shadow. "Good work, Shadow. You have retrieved one of the chaos emeralds. Now all we need is six more to complete our plans." Black Doom's voice came through the eye. Sonic walked up to the eye and asked "Who are you and what do you want with Shadow?" "Shadow has agreed to obtain the seven chaos emeralds for me and my army in our plans for your world." Black Doom said. Sonic looked to Shadow in disbelief and asked "Is that true, Shadow?"

Shadow was caught between two impossible choices. If he said no, then Black Doom would not tell Shadow what he knows about his origins. But if he said yes, he would be betraying his greatest rival and, possibly, best friend. Shadow continued to think hard until they heard a pair of screams coming from one direction. A Black Arm soldier had caught a young women and her daughter and raised its sword to kill them. "Yes, do it." Black Doom said. "No, don't!" Sonic shouted.

The alien raised its sword to its highest point and started its descent on the poor mother and daughter. But then, the sound of a gun shot rang through the air and the creature stopped only an inch from the young girls face. The girl looked up and watched as the alien stood there for a moment before falling sideways to the ground, dead. Sonic and Black Doom looked back to see Shadow holding a pistol he took from a dead G.U.N. soldier aimed at the aliens previous position.

"Shadow, What have you done?! You have attacked one of our soldiers!" Black Doom said furiously. Shadow said nothing as he aimed the loaded pistol at the Doom's Eye. "I don't take orders from you or anyone else. I follow my own commands, understand?" Shadow said as he placed his finger of the trigger. "This isn't over Shadow" Black Doom said before his eye flew away. Shadow dropped the gun and walked next to Sonic.

"There are most likely more aliens in the city. We must stop them before they destroy anymore lives." Shadow said to him. "Wow Shadow, you really surprise me. Back when I first met you, I never would have thought we would be working together." Sonic said running. Shadow smirked as he ran into the city along side Sonic, saying "Your right. I never would have guessed." They raced into the deeper part of the city the find a road block of Black Arm soldiers.

The Black Arms were facing Shadow and Sonic as the activated their laser shield and to create a wall. By the looks of the formation, it looked like they were trying to guard something from them. Sonic was able to peek though the wall a bit to see an alien soldier holding the blue chaos emerald. "He's got a chaos emerald." Sonic said. "Then we'll just have to get it back." Shadow said as he cracked his knuckles.

The hedgehog heroes charged at the wall of alien until they pulled out their strangely shaped gun and fired. Seeing them fire, Sonic and Shadow stopped dead in their tracks and jumped behind a piece of rubble. They could feel the rubble shake from the blasts, knowing that it wouldn't last for long. "Great, now what are he going to do?" Sonic asked. Shadow was equally clueless at how to proceed until he remembered the chaos emerald he had obtained earlier. He pulled out the green chaos emerald and showed it to Sonic, who smiled, knowing what Shadow had planned.

The Black Arm soldier kept blasting away at the rubble, trying to kill the hedgehogs behind it. Thinking it was taking to long, the soldier with the chaos emerald walked to the front line and pulled out small black gun with a large hole in the middle. The alien pulled the trigger and a missile-like blast escaped from it and destroyed the rubble and probably the heroes. They looked at the spot where the blast hit to see nothing but a small crater, causing them to think they had won. Big mistake.

Out of nowhere, a small yellow arrow plunged itself in the aliens head and killed it. The other looked to where the arrow had come from to see Sonic and Shadow falling from the sky, holding the green chaos emerald. The aliens resumed firing at the two and Sonic formed a familiar blue sphere of energy in his other hand. "Do it." Shadow said. As the shots came closer to them, Sonic threw the small blue sphere of energy at the aliens as it engulfed the shots along the way to become bigger.

When it had reached the ground, the sphere was the size of a Sonic's ego (And that's big). The aliens were expecting something to happen, but nothing did. "SONIC WIND!" Sonic shouted. The energy sphere finally gave out and released all the stored energy to create several blades of wind to chop all of the alien soldiers to pieces. The hedgehog duo had landed on the ground and Shadow was shocked at how powerful Sonic's attack had become.

"Your new move has become more skilled and powerful since the last time you used it." Shadow stated. Sonic smiled at Shadow for the compliment before saying "Well, I've been practicing while searching for Amy." Sonic walked to the dead alien soldier and grabbed the blue chaos emerald out of its hand. Sonic then surprisingly threw it to Shadow. "You deserve it after all you did today." Sonic said with a thumbs-up, which Shadow returned.

The Doom's Eye had returned and floated in front of Shadow. "Our men have found the third emerald in this city. I am giving you a chance to redeem yourself, Shadow. Bring me those chaos emeralds and all will be forgiven." Black Doom said before his eye floated off. "I guess that means…welcome to the next level! Let's go!" Sonic said as he ran off. Shadow saw that Sonic was acting reckless again and tried to stop him. "Sonic, stop! Oh, what's the use?" Shadow said to himself before chasing after Sonic.

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	3. Lethal Highway

**SHADOW THE HEDGEHOG**

Disclaimer: I do not own the Sonic characters, just the OC's

Chapter Three: Lethal Highway

Sonic and Shadow have arrived to another part of the city which was also destroyed by the invaders. In front of them was a long highway then had been broken thanks to the Black Arms and their alien explosives. "So where do you think they are holding the chaos emerald, Shadow?" Sonic asked. "Your guess is as good as mine." Shadow replied.

Sonic and Shadow looked up and down the broken highway, hoping to find anything that might be holding the chaos emerald. But while they were searching, the hedgehog duo did not notice a dark figure sneaking up behind them. The figure crept closer and closer behind Shadow without him taking notice. As the figure was about to reach its target, it accidentally kicked a rock, which alerted Shadow of its presence. Shadow looked back and gasped in horror as he stared at his worst nightmare: the love-struck Kumori.

"SHADOW!" Kumori shouted as she grabbed Shadow into a bone-breaking hug, which was suffocating Shadow. "Oh Shadow, I was worried I would never see you again." Kumori said as she released Shadow. Shadow took a few moments to catch his breath before saying "Kumori, I saw you yesterday." "It feels like an eternity when you're in love. Right, Shadow?" Kumori said with stars in her eyes. Shadow groaned and Sonic was laughing his head off at Shadow predicament.

The suddenly, the ground started to rumble and many of the stones on the ground moved in different directions. The group heard a noise coming from behind and looked to see a round grey, alien tank with side wings headed their way. Acting on instinct, Sonic jumped to the right as Shadow grabbed Kumori and jumped to the left to avoid the tank. The group watched as the flying tank passed by with Doom's Eye following it closed behind.

"That tank must have the chaos emerald." Shadow said. "It looks strong, but it's nothing we can't handle right Shadow." Sonic said to him. Sonic and Shadow were about to run when Kumori interrupted. "Shadow, where are you going?" Kumori asked. "We have to get the chaos emerald from that tank before those aliens take it." Shadow explained. "Then I'm going too." Kumori said. "No, you're not!" Shadow proclaimed. "Please." Kumori said, giving him the puppy eyes. No matter how strong or cold Shadow was, he could resist the eyes, and so he gave in.

"Alright, you can help." Shadow said. After receiving he answer, Kumori went from puppy eye to serious. "Alright you two, we have to stop that tank before it gets away! So don't fall behind, you got it!" Kumori said before chasing after the fleeing tank. Sonic and Shadow stared for a moment before Sonic said "Wow, super mood swings. Aren't you lucky to have a girlfriend like her?" "I'll kill you for that!" Shadow shouted as he chased after the laughing Sonic.

After a few seconds, Sonic and Shadow had reached Kumori along the broken road. "What took you? I was afraid I lost you." Kumori said to them. "Sorry, Shadow wanted to ask me where you two should go for your date." Sonic playfully lied to her. At that comment, Kumori's starry eyes had returned faster then you could say "chilidog". "Really?" Kumori asked Shadow hopefully. "No! Everything that idiot says is a lie!" Shadow shouted quickly to her. "Aw, no need to be embarrassed. I know you love me." Kumori said, causing Shadow to groan and slap his head hard, which really hurt.

After running a few good miles, the three hedgehogs had managed to reach the Black Arms tank. "Alright, let do it." Sonic said as he jumped to the air. Shadow and Kumori followed his example and all three hedgehogs used a homing attack on the tank. The problem was that the tank had an invisible force field, which bounced the trio to the ground. Three Black Arms soldier were walking along the highway, minding their business, when they heard a whistling sound coming from above and the hedgehog heroes fell on top of them, knocking them out.

"I guess these guys are useful after all." Shadow said as he looked down to the knocked out soldiers. "Shadow, the tank, it's getting away!" Kumori said as she pointed to the fleeing vehicle. Thinking fast, Shadow grabbed one of the alien soldiers oddly shaped weapons and fired it, the force from it caused him to fall back on to his butt. To their surprise, the shot had passed through the force field and landed a direct hit on the tanks right wing.

Shadow looked at the gun and said "These black creatures' guns can penetrate through the tanks the force field. But the aftershock from the blast is too great for me to handle." Shadow said to them. "But how are you gonna run and use that thing on the tank at the same time?" Sonic asked. Shadow had no idea how he was going to pull it off until something caught his eye and made him smirk. "Who said anything about running?" Shadow said.

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Down the highway, a few black Arms soldiers were outside the tank, trying to repair the damage Shadow caused to the right wing. Suddenly, a loud revving sound had filled the air and was coming from down the highway. The few soldiers looked down the road to see Shadow riding a black motorcycle and aimed his new gun at the aliens. Shadow fired thre shots, which landed straight at the alien's heads, killing them, and alerted the soldiers inside. The alien tank took off in a hurry with Shadow following close behind them.

"They don't really think they can escape me do they?" Shadow said to himself as he sped up after the tank. Soon, Shadow was riding right next to the tank. Shadow pulled out the alien gun and fired three shots at its side. The shots had alerted the aliens inside and one of them popped out of the top to fire on Shadow. As the alien fired its gun, Shadow acted fast and maneuvered the cycle to avoid the shots. Shadow decided to slow down and trail behind the tank.

"This thing has got to have a weak spot somewhere" Shadow thought. The Black Arms soldier turned to Shadow's direction and continued to fire on the hedgehog, making Shadow very frustrated. "I have had enough of you!" Shadow shouted as he pulled the trigger on the alien gun. Lucky for the soldier, the shot bounced off his gun. The bad part, the shot landed inside the tank and destroyed the controls for the force field.

Shadow saw the force field go down and thought it would be the perfect opportunity to strike. "Now I've got you." Shadow said as he jumped off the bike and into the air. Once in the air, over twenty yellow arrows appeared around him and he shouted "CHAOS SPEAR!" The arrows lunged themselves at the tank and broke through its hard metal body to destroy it and the alien soldiers inside.

Shadow was searching through the remains of the fallen tank and all he found were dead bodies, but no chaos emeralds. "I don't get it. I was sure the emerald would be here." Shadow said. Just then, a hologram of Black Doom appeared before him. "Shadow you deliberately disobeyed me." Black Doom stated. "I obey no one, especially someone like you." Shadow said to him as he began to walk away.

"It would seem that Professor Gerald has done more to your memory then I originally thought." Black Doom said. At hearing the name of his creator, Shadow halted and looked back to Black Doom. "The professor?" Shadow asked. "It is strange that you do not remember your maker." Black Doom said. "What did you say?!" Shadow asked, even more confused. "Silence, the ramifications of your disobedience will be severe." Black Doom stated. Then, Black Doom waved his hand and they both disappeared in a flash of light.

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At the G.U.N. base, a white haired man with one blue eye and one amber eye, wearing a military uniform, watched the screens as they witnessed the destruction the Black Arms were creating. One soldier had arrived and saluted to the person. "Comander, the black aliens have hit six major cities around the world, and every city is reporting significant damage and casualties. Among them, Westopolis has received the heaviest casualties, due to its weakened defense system. Downtown Westopolis has been almost completely destroyed. Unconfirmed sources have also reported seeing a black hedgehog in Westopolis." The soldier reported.

At the mention of a black hedgehog, the commander's interest had peaked. "Shadow? Deploy all troops now and if you find Shadow with the black aliens, kill him!" He commanded. "But sir, isn't Shadow on our side--" the soldier was cut off by his superior. "I gave you an order, soldier! He's evil and he's the enemy!" he said, full of hate. The soldier left the commander to himself. "You can't fool me, Shadow. This time… you're mine." The commander said silently.

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	4. Glyphic Canyon

**SHADOW THE HEDGEHOG**

Disclaimer: I do not own the Sonic characters, just the OC's

Chapter Four: Glyphic Canyon

In a deserted area far away from the city, Shadow found himself waking up in the entrance of many ruins. "Where am I?" Shadow asked as he rubbed his throbbing head. Shadow walked up to the end of a tall hillside to see the entire ruin area. "Whoa… I guess I underestimated his powers. There is a reason Black Doom brought me here and I have to find out what." Shadow said as he ran off into the ruins.

As he made his way deeper into the ruins, a Black Arms soldier jumped out in front of him and aimed its gun at his forehead. The creature was about to fire when it was tackled to the ground by a red blur. Shadow took a closer look to see that it was Knuckles who was beating the alien soldier to a pulp. Knuckles got up from his defeated enemy and looked back to his old friend, Shadow.

"Hey Shadow. I haven't seen you in a while." Knuckles said. "Knuckles, what are you doing here?" questioned Shadow. "Well, Angel Island was attack and these black creatures tried to steal the Master Emerald. But I was able to keep it safe. I followed these creatures to these ruins. What are you doing here, Shadow?" Knuckles asked. "I'm not sure." Shadow said to him. "What, how can you not be sure?" Knuckles asked. Shadow was about to reply when they heard gunshots and people shouting. "Sounds like trouble. Come on, Shadow" Knuckles said as he ran off with Shadow close behind.

When Shadow and Knuckles arrive at the scene of the battle, the Black Arms were fighting the G.U.N. soldier with their new work-like alien, the Black Annelid. "Keep your distance men!" The leader shouted as he shot down another Black Warrior (Black Arms soldier). Shadow walks up to leader causally and asks "Do you need any help?" Shadow asked. The G.U.N. leader looked at Shadow and aimed his gun at him, which surprised Shadow. "Sorry, but I have orders to destroy. I really don't want to do this." The leader said and readied himself to pull the trigger and kill him.

But he was interrupted when he heard a scream of terror from one of the soldiers. Everyone looked over to find one of the G.U.N. soldiers about to be eaten by the Black Annelid. All seemed hopeless for the soldier until a black blur went past the worm and its head was severed from the rest of its body. The almost-killed soldier looked to his savior to Shadow standing next to him. Shadow looked over to the G.U.N. leader as he spoke into his portable communicator.

"Attention all units, front line enemies have been defeated. Proceed to the inner section of the ruins and take out all enemy forces." The leader commanded. The leader stared at Shadow, who stared back, and then grabbed his communication once more. "And if you see Shadow, assist him I anyway possible." The leader added to his previous command. The leader smiled to the black hedgehog. "Go. We'll take care of things from here." The leader told him. Shadow nodded his head and said "Thank you. Come on, Knuckles." "Right behind you!" Knuckles shouted as he ran after Shadow.

After a long and difficult trudge through rubble, sand and strange tornados, Shadow and Knuckles reached a temple filled with Black Warriors and Black Annelids. "This doesn't look like it's going to be easy." Knuckles said out loud. "When is it ever easy?" Shadow returned. "What do you say to a little contest?" Knuckles offered. "What kind of contest?" Shadow asked. "Who ever takes out the most black creatures, wins." Knuckles explained. "You're on." Shadow accepted.

Knuckles was the first to strike as he jumped on to the first Black Warrior he could reach and landed a solid blow to the face, crushing it. Another Black Warrior ran towards Knuckles and swung its energy sword at him. Knuckles jumped to avoid the sword, only to be hit by a laser blast in the shoulder. Knuckles fell to the ground and saw a large group of Black warriors surrounding him. "Don't think I'm out just yet!" Knuckles shouted as he put on his shovel claws and dug a hole underneath them.

The Black Warriors wasted no time in firing down the hole Knuckles went. They halted their attack and waited to see if they had killed him or not. But while they were waiting, the ground started to crack and form a circle around the small group. Knuckles the chose to appear above ground and the Black warrior aimed their guns at him. Knuckles smirked for a moment before plowing the ground with his fist. The cracked circle had become complete with Knuckles attack and the ground below the aliens gave way and the fell through.

"Well they didn't last long." Knuckles said as he looked down the hole he had made. "How are you doing Shadow?" Knuckles asked his competition. Knuckles looked over to Shadow's side to find the Black Warriors and Annelids were beaten, fried, skewered, chopped and just plain dead. He saw Shadow leaning over one of the temple statues and asked "How did you do all this?" Shadow pulled out the green chaos emerald and Knuckles said "Hey, that's cheating." "You never said anything about not using chaos emeralds." Shadow told Knuckles, who said nothing after he realized he had been out smarted (what a surprise.)

Shadow walked up to a strange green stone with other stone rings surrounding it. "I'm going to go look for a way out of this place. What about you Shadow?" Knuckles asked. "I think I'll stay here for a moment." Shadow said. Knuckles just shrugged and started to walk away. Shadow continued to stare at the strange stone, entranced by it. "I see you find this stone interesting, Shadow" Shadow looked back to see Doom's Eye floating a few feet from him.

"What is so special about this stone?" Shadow asked. "This particular stone is part of a pair that can awaken our flying fortress from its sleep." Black Doom explained. "Sleep?" said the confused hedgehog. "Have you not noticed? This temple is alive and I need you to activate the stones to awaken it." Black Doom explained. Shadow began to walk away and said "I told you, I take orders from no one."

"Do you not want to find out the truth of your creation? I though you would be more interested in the reason you were created. I will leave you to decide." Black Doom said before his eye floated away. During Black Doom's speech, Shadow had stop to think for a moment. He wanted to find out the reason he was created, but was it worth losing his friends over. Shadow looked back at the stone once more, coming to a decision.

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A few minutes later, Shadow was walking alongside Knuckles, who had managed to find an exit that lead to the upper shrine. Knuckles looked at the shrine and said "This reminds me of the Master Emerald shrine back on Angel Island. Great, now I'm getting homesick." Shadow made no reply. As the duo walked closer to the shrine, they were attacked by five more Black Annelids. "These guys don't give up do they?" Knuckles said out loud.

The Black annelids then burrowed their way underground, leaving Knuckles worried. "Where did they go?" Knuckles asked. Shadow then felt a small tremor below his feet and push Knuckles and himself out of the way before the annelids struck. Knuckles fell on his face, while Shadow landed perfectly on his feet and was getting angry. "I have had enough of you black freaks!" Shadow shouted. Knuckles saw his body beginning to glow red quickly ran to find himself a place to hide. The Annelids moved in closer as Shadow shouted "CHAOS BLAST!!!"

The red glow from Shadow's body released itself and created a huge explosion, which destroyed all the Black Annelids. After the attack was finished, Shadow had collapsed to his knees and Knuckles tried to help him up. "Wow that was some attack. When did you learn to do that?" Knuckles asked him. "Right here…just now." Shadow replied breathlessly. Knuckles pulled Shadow up the shrine and laid him next to a stone similar to the one in the lower level.

After Shadow took a few moments to regain his strength, he weakly managed to get back on his feet. Shadow then found a yellow chaos emerald land in his hand and looked up to see it was Knuckles who threw it to him. "I found it a little while back, I think you deserve it after the way you helped everyone today." Knuckles said to him. Shadow turned himself away from Knuckles and said "That's right. I did help everyone. Even Black Doom." Shadow said out loud. "WHAT?!" Knuckles shouted in surprise.

Shadow used his super speed to elbow Knuckles in the gut hard to knock him out. "Sorry Knuckles, but I don't want you to get hurt." Shadow said as he grabbed Knuckles and ran to one of the near by mountains. Shadow laid Knuckles on the ground and ran back to the temple. Once there, Shadow placed his hand on the green stone and activated it. Just as Black Doom said, the temple came to life and started to move itself off the ground.

"I guess Black Doom was telling the truth after all. This place really is alive" Shadow said. Just then Black Doom had appeared out of nowhere and this time he was the real thing. "So we finally meet Shadow." Black Doom said. "So what do you want me to do now…Master?" Shadow said, struggling with the last part. "You need to find the last four more emeralds to complete our plans." Black Doom told him. "Do you know where they are?" Shadow asked. "I know three places where the fourth emerald might be. Don't fail me." Black Doom threatened as he used chaos control to transport Shadow to a new location.

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	5. Return to Prison Island

**SHADOW THE HEDGEHOG**

Disclaimer: I do not own the Sonic characters, just the OC's

Chapter Five: Return to Prison Island

In a flash of light Shadow apeears in the air and falls to the ground on his feet. he takes the time to look at his new surroundings. It was a destroyed military base with toxic waste spread out all over the place. Shadow looked around once more and soon remembered where he was. "This is Prison Island, the place I escaped. But how is it still standing?" Shadow questioned. Shadow then looked to the yellow chaos emerald he had obtained and saw that it did not glow. "That means the chaos emerald is not here. This is a waste of my time." Shadow said.

Shadow was about to use chaos control to leave the island until a faint buzzing sound had reached his ears. Shadow looked over to see a small bee headed his way. The bee looked to be six years old and wore a black pilot's helmet with red trims with black and yellow flight goggles, white gloves with black cuffs, an orange vest with a bee patch on it and orange sneakers. The bee could not see where he was going because he was staring at three shiny disks in his hands and ran into Shadow.

Shadow and the bee tumbled down the hill until they reached the bottom and landed with a small thud. After landing, Shadow got back on to his feet and wiped off all the dirt that had got onto his fur. Shadow looked over to find the bee was stuck half-way inside an empty barrel, upside down. Being the merciful hedgehog he was, Shadow grabbed the bee y his legs and pulled him out of the barrel, which was surprisingly so hard that it took three whole minutes to do so.

"Hey thanks for the…" the bee trailed off when he saw Shadow in front of him. Then the bee let out a loud scream in Shadow's ear, which caused him to jump up in surprise and fall on his back. Shadow looked up from his position to find that the bee was sitting on his stomach. "Oh my gosh, your Shadow the hedgehog." The young bee said with excitement. "Yeah." Shadow said. "Cool, I'm Charmy, of Team Chaotix, and I am your biggest fan. Can I have your autograph" Charmy asked as he pulled a pen and paper out of nowhere.

"Uh, no. listen I don't have time for you. I have a very important assignment to complete." Shadow said as he push Charmy off him and started to walk away. Charmy flew in front to stop him and said "That's so cool. Hey do you think you can help me. Vector told me to find five top secret disks. I already found three. Can you help me find the rest?" Charmy asked. "No." Shadow coldly replied as he continued to walk away. "You aren't going to leave me here alone are you?" Charmy called out.

Shadow stopped in his tracks after that comment. Many people would think that Shadow was a cold and heartless monster, but he wasn't. He knew that the strange kid had gotten lucky so far, but who knows how long that luck would last. Shadow looked back to Charmy and said "Alright I'll help." "YAY!" Charmy shouted as he flew off into a random direction. "What have I gotten myself into?" Shadow asked himself.

As Shadow and his new companion, Charmy, walked further into the base (or in Charmy's case, fly), they noticed the Black Warriors were being held inside steel enforced cages. "Whoa, what are these things?" Charmy asked as he flew near one of the Black Warrior cages. When Charmy was close enough, A Black Warrior reached its arm out to grab the hyperactive bee. Charmy panicked for a moment until Shadow grabbed his stinger and pulled him away from the Black Warrior.

Shadow stared angrily at Charmy as he held the poor bee upside-down by his stinger. "Look kid, if you want my help then stay out of trouble." Shadow said venomously. Charmy flew right side-up as Shadow let go of his stinger and he buzzed around with excitement. "Whatever you say, Shadow. You're so cool." Charmy said. Shadow walked on, trying his best to not kill the annoying bee until he felt his foot hit something on the ground.

Shadow looked down and picked up a small disc that had the words "Secret Files" on it. "Hey, is this it?" Shadow asked Charmy. The small bee looked to Shadow and quickly grabbed the disk out of his hand once he saw it. "Wow, you found it. I knew you could do it, Shadow. You're the greatest person ever that ever lived." Charmy said in his annoying voice. Shadow's eye was twitching as Charmy continued to buzz around, praising Shadow for his small accomplishment.

Shadow slowly tried to sneak away from the crazy, overexcited bee, but he was caught in a minute. "Hey Shadow, where are you going?" Charmy asked. Shadow quickly tried to come up with an excuse and all he could come up with was "Oh, I'm just going to find that last disk." "Great, let's go!" Charmy shouted as he flew off with Shadow slowly walking behind. Not knowing that they were being followed.

Shadow and Charmy had reached a dead end as they found a slope of toxic waste. "Look's like it's the end of the line." Shadow said. Then, a strange sound came from behind and the duo looked back to see four Black Warriors on miniature flying saucers. One of the Black Warrior fired its gun at the two and they jumped out of the way to avoid it. When Shadow landed, he was trapped between two Black Warrior aliens.

With Shadow in their sights, the two black aliens fired their guns directly at him. Unfortunately for them, Shadow used his spin dash to move out of the way and the blasts hit and killed each other. See that the flying saucers were unoccupied, Shadow grabbed Charmy by his stinger and jumped on to the saucer. "Hang on, kids!" Shadow shouted as he steered the saucer down the toxic slope.

Charmy was so extremely excited about riding the saucer that it was become very difficult for Shadow to hold on to him. Shadow looked back for a moment and found the two remaining warriors were chasing them down the slope. "They don't give up do they?" Shadow said out loud. "Uh, Shadow what is that?" Charmy asked as he pointed forward. Shadow looked to the direction Charmy was pointing and saw a heavily armored G.U.N. hunter aiming its weapon at them.

"Primary targets in sight. Locking on to targets." The hunter said. The hunter aims its weapon at the duo and heard it say "Targets locked on. Firing sequence initiated." the hunter said. The G.U.N. hunter let out two shots and Shadow tried to cover Charmy before the shots had hit them. But the shots never came. Instead they went past Shadow and Charmy and went through the remaining Black Warriors heads, killing them.

Shadow and Charmy rode the final few feet of the toxic slope until they landed on solid ground and jump off the miniature saucer. Shadow then noticed a G.U.N. soldier standing near the hunter and saluted the two. "Greetings Shadow. The leader said you might be here." The soldier said. "What are you doing here?" Shadow asked. "The leader gave a command to assist you in anyway possible. I saw you on the islands security camera and thought you might want this." The soldier replied as he showed them the last disk they have been searching for.

Charmy grabbed it out of the mans hand and shouted "Alright, we did it!" "Are their any chaos emeralds on this island?" Shadow questioned the soldier. "I'm sorry, Shadow. But there aren't any chaos emeralds here." The soldier said to him. "Then I just wasted my time." Shadow said as he pulled out the blue chaos emerald. "Wait!" Charmy shouted. "Later kid. CHAOS CONTROL!" shadow shouted before disappearing in a flash of light. "What about my autograph?!" Charmy shouted.

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	6. Circus Park

**SHADOW THE HEDGEHOG**

Disclaimer: I do not own the Sonic characters, just the OC's

Chapter Six: Circus Park

In a flash of lblue ight, Shadow fall form the sky and touched down to the ground to look at the new area Black Doom had sent him to. It looked to be some kind of theme park with a mass of lights and an ugly face sign that could only belong to one person, Eggman. "You have got to be kidding me. The fourth chaos emerald is inside this place? This is just wrong." Shadow said out loud. It was at that time that Black Doom's Eye floated down from out of nowhere and floated right next to Shadow.

"Are you sure that the chaos emerald is inside here?" Shadow asked the alien eye. "Yes, I can feel the presence of a chaos emerald in this place. Find it and retrieve it, by any means necessary." Black Doom said before his eye flew away into the sky. Shadow looked forward at the theme park entrance and you could clearly see he was majorly annoyed. "I just got away from that annoying insect and now I have to go in here. This is definatly turning out to be the worst day ever." Shadow, for the first time in his life, complained.

Shadow walked up to the entrance to see two of Eggmans small egg pawns robots guarding it. "Pathetic." Shadow said. When the egg pawns saw him walking into the park they charged at him with their medieval lances. Shadow made no effort to avoid them but instead, he grabbed the end of the lances and flipped the pawns off into the distance. "This is just too easy, guess it's my lucky day." Shadow said.

As Shadow walked into the park, he noticed a flying TV screen headed his way. When the flying TV had reached Shadow, the screen turned on and showed the face of a familiar evil scientist. It was Ivo Robotnik a.k.a Dr. Eggman. "Shadow, what are you doing here?" the doctor questioned. "I have come for the chaos emerald. I know you have it, so hand it over!" Shadow ordered. "The chaos emerald, huh? How about we work out a deal." Eggman offered. "A deal?" "If you can get rid of the G.U.N. soldiers in my theme park, I will repay you with the chaos emerald." Eggman said. "Deal." Shadow accepted as he ran off into the theme park.

When Shadow had reached to a further part of Eggman's Park, he had found six gun soldiers, twelve beetle robots and one heavy armored hunter. One of the soldiers had spotted him and shouted to the rest of them "Hey look, it's Shadow!" The other soldiers spotted him as well and gave a proud salute to him. "Greetings Shadow. What are you doing here?" the group leader asked. "Just getting rid of some worthless trash." Shadow said to them. "Any way we can help?" the leader asked. "Yes. You can die." Shadow said calmly.

The soldiers looked shocked as Shadow pounced on them. Shadow first grabbed the leader by his throat and dragged him on the ground until he threw the man against the one of the park signs, breaking his spine and killing him upon impact. The other five soldiers looked in terror as Shadow began to walk closer to them. "Someone call for back up and activate the robots, NOW!" a soldier ordered. "Yes sir." Another soldier said as he ran away.

On command, the beetle robots and the hunter had become active. The beetles aimed their small guns at Shadow and opened fire on him. Shadow used his super speed to avoid the bullets with ease and jumped forward to one of the beetles. Shadow landed on top of one of the beetle robots and forcefully turned its direction at the others. While Shadow was changing its direction, the beetle robot continued to fire its gun and shot down the other robots. When all the other beetles were all gone, Shadow had delivered a striking blow to the robots core and jumped off before it exploded.

When Shadow had touched the ground, he was facing a heavy armored hunter with a large cannon aimed at him. "Crap." Shadow said as the hunter launched a missile at Shadow. Thinking quickly, Shadow jumped on top of the missile and started riding it through the air. Shadow was steering the missile all around the sky like a surf board on a wave and changed the direction of the missile towards the hunter that fired it. As they came closer to colliding, Shadow jumped off the missile before it hit its target and destroyed it.

Shadow stood there for a moment before facing the last remaining G.U.N. soldiers. "Do whatever you can to kill that hedgehog." One of the soldiers said. The four soldiers lifted their guns and started shooting at the once great hero of the world. Shadow made effort to move as he waved his hand into the air and several yellow arrows formed around him. "CHAOS SPEAR!" Shadow shouted. The arrows shot past Shadow and burned the bullets that were aimed at him before killing the remaining G.U.N. soldiers.

"That was too easy." Shadow said. Shadow was about to walk away to recover the chaos emerald that Eggman had promised him but then felt a pain in his knee. Shadow fell to the ground holding his knee before he moved his hands to find out the cause of the pain. In the side of his leg was a small gun bullet. Shadow pulled the bullet out of his knee and looked up to find a mass of G.U.N. soldiers and robots surrounding him.

"Alright hedgehog. Come along quietly and we promise not to hurt you." one of the soldiers said. "That hurt." Shadow said, not hearing the soldier's words. "Are you going to comply or do we have to force you?" the soldier asked. "That hurt. That was a mistake. The last mistake you will ever MAKE!!!" Shadow shouted in anger. "YOU FILTHY HUMANS. I'LL KILL YOU!!!" Shadow continued in rage.

Shadow's body was being enveloped in a red glow like before at Glyphic Canyon, which was scaring the soldiers. "Don't just stand there! Shoot him!" the soldier shouted. Soon all the G.U.N. soldiers and robots were shooting at the glowing hedgehog but had no effect as the bullets were bouncing off his body . After gathering enough energy Shadow shouted "CHAOS BLAST!!!" The red glow released itself and destroyed all the soldiers and robots in an instant.

After all was done, Shadow fall to the ground, face forward, with absolutely no strength to move. "That…attacks. Better…not…use it…again." Shadow weakly said, trying to catch his breath. Just then, Eggman's TV decided to show up. "Amazing Shadow. I had no idea you could do that." Eggman said. "Me…neither." Shadow replied. "And as promised, here is a chaos emerald. Good-bye for now." Eggman said before his TV shut off and dropped down the white chaos emerald.

Gather all the remaining strength he had, Shadow reached out and grabbed the chaos emerald to inspect it. Just then, Doom's Eye suddenly appeared bofe Shadow. "Good work, Shadow. Now all that remains are three chaos emeralds." Black Doom said. "Wrong." Shadow said to him. Doom's Eye looked confused until Shadow crushed the chaos emerald to dust in his hands. "That emerald is a fake." Black Doom said, clearly mad. "The doctor is much smarter then I thought." Shadow said out loud.

"We must make him pay for this trickery. Shadow there is still one last place left to look, that scientist castle." Black Doom said. "I would, but I can't move." Shadow said to him. "Very well. I shall return you to the fortress and allow you to rest. We need in one piece if we are to complete our plans." Black Doom said. The alien eye latched itself on to the tired hedgehogs back and they both disappeared in a flash of light.

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	7. Cryptic Castle

**SHADOW THE HEDGEHOG**

Disclaimer: I do not own the sonic characters, just the OC's

Chapter Seven: Cryptic Castle

One day has passed since the destruction of G.U.N. back at Eggman's theme park. Shadow had just arrived at an ancient castle that Black Doom said belong to Eggman. "Hmm… knowing the doctor, he would keep the chaos emerald with him at all times. Good, now I can make him pay for deceiving me." Shadow said as he ran off into the castle.

When Shadow had reached the entrance of the castle he was, once again, attacked by two egg pawns. "It looks like the doctor is running out of tricks." Shadow said. Shadow jumped high above the egg pawns and used a homing attack to go directly through them at once. Shadow looked back at the destroyed pawns for a moment, not realizing that another one was right behind him. The pawn was about to strike when a red blur whizzed by a sliced it in two.

Shadow had heard the sound of metal being ripped apart coming from behind him and looked back to see what caused it. Once he looked back, Shadow was staring at his old and mysteriously unknown friend, Mach. "Hey Shadow what are you doing here?" Mach asked. "I came to find Eggman and take back the chaos emerald he took from me." Shadow told him, leaving out the part about him working for Black Doom.

Shadow continued to walk through the castle and found that Mach was following him. "By the way, what are you doing here, Mach?" Shadow asked. "I was helping Cream get back home until Cheese flew off and Cream followed him in here. I can't find them anywhere." Mach explained. Shadow stopped in his tracks after that. Cream, the little girl he met on the ARK, was lost somewhere in this castle and Eggman was here as well. Shadow could only imagine what the doctor would do if he found her.

Shadow turned back at Mach and said "I will help you." "Really?" Mach asked in surprise. "We can't let Eggman find her. She is only a little girl and she is more vulnerable then anyone else. We can't let anything happen to her." Shadow said with determination. Mach walked up to him and mockingly said "So you do have a heart, huh Shadow." "Don't think anything of it. I am only doing this for Cream, no one else." Shadow said. "Whatever you say. Come on." Mach said as he ran farther into the castle with Shadow not far behind.

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After a short run through the castle, Shadow and Mach were once again outside, staring at a gigantic lantern. "Whoa, it's huge" Mach emphasized. "It is most likely a defense system set up by Eggman, to keep out all intruders." Shadow said to his companion. "So how does it work?" Mach questioned. Shadow seemed stump as he looked all over the lantern for any signs that might help them get past. Shadow looked down to find two small pedestals with a candle in each of them.

"I think I might know how to get past this thing." Shadow said. "How?" Mach questioned. "If we can light these pedestals, then we might be able to advance further into the castle. But the question is, how are we going to light it." Shadow said. Mach and Shadow looked around the area, hoping to find something to light the pedestal. Soon, Mach stopped searching and became very interested in Shadow's hover skates. Shadow saw this and asked "What?"

Mach quickly grabbed Shadow's foot and lifted it up to the pedestal, causing Shadow to fall on his back. "What do you think are you doing?!" Shadow yelled out. Mach then somehow activated the hover skates and lit the candles on the pedestals with them. Mach rel/\eased Shadow's foot and allowed him to stand up on his own two feet again. Once he was up again, Shadow gave Mach a hard punch over the head. "Do that again and I won't be so merciful." Shadow said to the aching Mach.

With the pedestals now lit, a few skull shaped balloons appeared out of nowhere and formed a path to an upper level. "How do you think Egg-butt manages to get up there?" Mach asked jokingly "Are you just going to stand around all day, making terrible jokes, or are we going to save Cream?" Shadow said to him as he followed the balloon path. "Geez, he has no sense of humor." Mach said as he followed Shadow up the newly formed path.

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Once Shadow and Mach made their way past the balloons, the found themselves in a small room. Shadow and Mach were about to leave through the door on the other side of the room until a faint sound had caught his ear. Shadow closed his eyes to try and concentrate on the strange sound until he heard a faint 'Chao'. "Hey Shadow, what's taking ya." Mach asked, breaking Shadow out of his concentrated state.

Shadow walked to a nearby wall and placed his ear on to the side of it. "What are you doing?" Mach asked, thinking he had gone crazy. Shadow shushed him as he walked along the wall and continued to listen into it. He nearly listened into all the walls in the room until he heard the 'Chao' sound again, even stronger. Shadow stepped away from the wall before pulling back his fist and slamming it straight through the wall.

The wall had crumbled from Shadow's attack and gave way to a secret space that had contained Cream and Cheese. Cream looked up scared for a moment before seeing that her rescuer was Shadow. "Shadow!" Cream yelled in happiness. "So this is where you've been Cream. How did you get in here?" Mach asked as he stood next to Cream. "Well, I was chasing Cheese when that mean Eggman caught us and threw us in here." Cream explained. "If you want to stay out of trouble, then stay away from places like this." Shadow told the young rabbit. "Ok." Cream said.

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After a long trek through the castle, braving perilous traps and Eggman's midget robots, the group had reached outside of the other side of the castle. When they first arrived, Shadow quickly noticed the white chaos emerald floating in the air, this time he knew it was real. "The chaos emerald now belongs to me." Shadow said as he walked closer to the emerald. But as he had gotten closer, a giant red and blue robot with a mace on its hand (egg breaker) jumped from out of nowhere. Sitting in the head of the robot was none other then Doctor Eggman.

"What are you doing here, Shadow?" Eggman questioned. "Doctor, I need that chaos emerald. That emerald may hold the secrets to my--" Shadow was cut off by Eggman. "Enough of this nonsense. All the chaos emeralds belong to me and me alone. And if you still disagree with me, then I will crush you like I will those black creatures." Eggman said as he swung the robots mace arm threateningly. "Cream, hide." Mach said. Cream followed her instructions and moved out of the way for Shadow and Mach to fight the evil scientist.

Eggman started things off by sending his mace hand plummeting towards the two, but they manage to avoid the attack with their speed. Mach jumped at the egg breakers leg and gave it a powerful kick, but was only able to shake it a little. Eggman swung the robots mace around and struck Mach with a powerful blow. Seeing his chance, Shadow jumped to the air and used a homing attack aimed at Eggman himself. Unfortunately the other hand came up and swatted him away.

Shadow landed next to Mach, who was slowly lifting himself up off the ground. "Ha-ha-ha, did you two stood any chance against the great Doctor Eggman, the greatest mind in the world, the---" The duo pretty much drowned out Eggman's boasting after that. "I hate to say it, but the doctor has us pinned." Shadow said. Mach then notice that a yellow chaos emerald was on the ground next to Shadow's foot and quickly came up with a plan.

"Hey Shadow, what about chaos control?" Mach said. Shadow also looked down at the chaos emerald he had dropped and smiled to Mach, approving his plan. The two looked back to Eggman, who was still rambling on, and saw the perfect opportunity to strike. Shadow grabbed the chaos emerald off the ground and Shouted "CHAOS CONTROL!" with that Shadow had disappeared.

Eggman had finish his very long speech (Finally) and noticed that Shadow was no longer with Mach. "Hey, where did Shadow go?" the doctor questioned. His question was soon answered when he heard a whistle sound from behind him. Eggman looked back to see Shadow standing next to Cream, holding a large wrench. Eggman was confused at why Shadow would have a wrench with him until the entire egg breaker fell to pieces and Eggman along with it.

Eggman was now covered by the remains of his previous creation and was knocked out cold. Shadow also took the opportunity to take the white emerald away from the doctor's possession. "I now have four emeralds. That leaves only three more." Shadow said silently as he stared at the shimmering emerald. Mach was standing next to Cream and was thanking Shadow for his assistance. "Thanks Shadow. If it wasn't for you I would probably be dead." Mach said. "Most likely." Shadow said coldly before walking away.

"Man, he is still as moody as the time I first met him in Station Square." Mach said out loud. Shadow halted his movement after that comment and looked back at Mach. What was he saying, Shadow and Mach never met in Station Square. "But Mach, I thought you first met Shadow on the ARK." Cream told him. Realizing what he just said, Mach quickly grabbed Cream and said good-bye to Shadow before running off to a random direction. "There is something strange about that Mach guy. I better keep a closer eye on him" Shadow though as he walked out of the eerie castle.

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	8. Mad Matrix

**SHADOW THE HEDGEHOG**

Disclaimer: I do not own the sonic characters, just the OC's

Chapter Eight: Mad Matrix

After the battle against Eggman, Shadow was trying to leave the castle, but there was one problem. He had lost his way. "How am I supposed to get out of here if I don't know where 'here' is?" Shadow asked himself. Shadow had been traveling the strange castle, with absolutely no idea where he was headed, and usually ran into a dead end. But while he was walking down another hallway, an unknown sound had reached his ears. Shadow focused on the new sound to find that it sounded like computer keys being pressed.

Shadow followed the sound down the hallway until he reached a metal door and opened it. The room he had entered was completely different then the rest of the castle. Instead of stone, the walls were made of metal and a large computer core was at the center of the room. Shadow saw a new character at the control console of the computer and decided to investigate who it was.

Shadow silently walked up to the stranger but was then caught by surprise as the stranger turned around and held a large shuriken to his neck. The stranger was a purple chameleon with a yellow horn between his eyes, three black spikes on his back and a long coiled tail. The stranger was wearing white gloves with black cuffs with white bandages and small grey compartments, violet shoes with black straps and cuffs with bandages above them. Judging by the large shuriken and the accurate hearing, Shadow could tell that this guy was a ninja.

"Who are you? Are you an assassin?" questioned the chameleon. "No, my name is Shadow the hedgehog." Shadow explained. Once he had heard Shadow's name, the chameleon lower his shuriken and placed it into one of the compartments on his wrist. "So you're Shadow, huh? I am Espio of Team Chaotix. Charmy talks about you a lot." Espio said. "You know the little pest?" Shadow asked. "Unfortunately." Espio replied before turning back to the computer console.

"So what are you doing in a place like this?" Shadow asked. "I am trying to hack into Eggman's computer main frame to figue out Eggman's plans. But I'm not very good at it." Espio said. Shadow walked up to the console and pushed Espio out of the way. "Well, this is an amazing coincidence. I am also interested in the good doctor's plans." Shadow said. Shadow raised his hand up and brought it down hard onto the computer.

After Shadow struck the console, the core in the center glowed and opened up a portal to a digital dimension. "This should take us straight to the doctor's computer main frame. It is their, we will find what we need." Shadow said. "We?" Espio asked. "Do you want my help or not?" Shadow returned the question. "Very well, let's go." Espio said. Shadow and Espio jumped into the portal and began their search.

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When Shadow and Espio first arrived in the digital dimension, they both landed on a strip of light that forced them into ball form. "What's going on?" Shadow asked. "I don't know." Espio replied. They two hackers used their ball forms to travel along the light-way until they reached the end and were facing a small computer terminal. "This must be the terminal to Eggman's files." Espio said as he accessed the terminal.

When Espio had gained access to the files, he learned that all the files were incomplete. "Eggman is much more clever then I thought. He apparently fragmented the data and sent it to three more terminals." Espio explained. "Any idea where they are?" Shadow asked. "They should be in the towers in the upper levels. Let me get the data from here and we'll go." Espio said. Espio pulled out a small disk from behind his back and placed it in the terminal to download the information. Once the download was complete, Espio took the disk and followed Shadow to the upper levels.

When Shadow and Espio reached the upper level, the looked out to see a maze of light-ways leading to red, green, yellow towers. "I'm guessing those are the towers." Shadow said. "Yes, it would seem that we have a need to split up." Espio said. Espio threw Shadow a blank disk and he caught it and looked at Espio. "Once you reach the terminal, download the information on to this disk so we will have it for later." Espio said. "Got it" Shadow said as they both used the light-ways to head off into different directions.

* * *

Espio had arrived to the green tower and was face with five colored pads on the ground in front of him. "Hmm...what could these be for?" Espio thought as he looked from the colored pads to the electric gate guarding the entrance. Espio got down on his knees and touched the colored pad, causing it to change colors. "I get it, if I want to get past the defenses, then I must match the color together." Espio said. After a few minutes of figuring out the color patterns, Espio managed to match the colors and opened the electrical gate.

Once inside, Espio found three float color pad similar to the ones outside and quickly knew what had to be done. As Espio was about to reach out to the pads, three egg pawns appeared out of nowhere and aimed their lasers at Espio. "Wasn't expecting that." Espio said. The egg pawns launch their assault on Espio as he pulled out a large shuriken to block the lasers. Espio knew that his shuriken would not provide as a good shield, so he put the shuriken away and formed a hand sign before disappearing into thin air.

The egg pawns looked all over the area hoping to find him, only to be sliced in half by the air. When the egg pawns were destroyed, Espio appeared once more and rearranged the color pads to match each other. When Espio was done, the gravity in the room had suddenly disappeared and Espio floated upwards into a higher level of the tower. When Espio touched down to a higher level, the gravity turned back on as he walked over to a terminal he had just found. Espio placed and empty disk inside the terminal and downloaded the information. Two down, two to go.

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When Shadow arrived at the yellow tower, he too found a color pad security system, but figured it out much faster then Espio. When Shadow had reached the inside of the tower, he found the computer terminal only a few feet away from him. "This seems too easy." Shadow thought. Shadow walked over to the terminal until he was unexpectedly attacked by a Black Annelid. "So, the doctor decided to take these creature for research. This makes things a lot more interesting." Shadow said.

The Black Annelid lunged at Shadow, but he had managed to avoid the attack with enough time. The Black Annelid burrowed underground so that Shadow couldn't follow it. "Where did it go?" Shadow asked. He question was soon answered when the Black Annelid struck Shadow from under his feet. See his chance, Shadow shouted "CHAOS SPEAR!" and his signature attack killed the alien worm in an instant. With his opponent dead, Shadow walked over and placed the empty disk he received inside the terminal. Three down, one to go.

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After obtaining the information from the yellow and green towers, Shadow and Espio met up in front of the red tower. "Greetings, Shadow. I expect your mission went successful." Espio said. Shadow smirked as he held up the small disk before throwing it to Espio. "Of course." Shadow said. "That leaves only one more terminal and it should be inside this tower." Espio said as he looked towards the tower. "Well then, what are we waiting for?" Shadow said as he ran off with Espio close behind.

Shadow and Espio made it in the tower with no problem until they ran into a group of egg paws and Black Annelids. "I'll take the black aliens, you get the robots." Shadow instructed. "Right." Espio said as he pulled out a large shuriken and jumped at the mini robots. The egg pawns raised their lasers at Espio and fired them on the ninja chameleon. Espio used his shuriken as a shield before throwing it at the egg pawns and sliced through three of the robots. Espio caught the shuriken when it came back and found himself surrounded by the robots when he touched the ground.

"That isn't good." Espio said. The egg pawn raised their lasers at the chameleon once more. Thinking fast, Espio jumped out of the way of the lasers and allowed them to destroy each other. "Not very smart are they?" Espio said. Shadow was now faced with three giant Black Annelids that would make any man run in fear. But not Shadow. Shadow decided to not hold back on these guys as he pulled out his newly acquired, white chaos emerald. "Die, you alien freaks! CHAOS CONTROL!" Shadow shouted before disappearing. After a few seconds of waiting, a black tornado surrounded them and then Shadow appeared once again.

Time seemed to have stopped for a moment as everyone was waiting for something to happen. Then, cut marks appeared all over the Black Annelids and then they fell to pieces, literally. While Shadow was busy fighting the aliens, Espio decided to reach the last terminal and download all the information off of it. "That's the last bit of data." Espio said as he held up to complete disk. "I couldn't have done it with out you. Thank you, Shadow." Espio said as he bowed his head in respect.

"Come on, lets get out of here." Shadow said. Shadow grabbed Espio by his arm and raised his chaos emerald into the air. "CHAOS CONTROL" Shadow shouted. And in a flash of white light, Shadow and Espio were gone.

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	9. Sky Troopers

**SHADOW THE HEDGEHOG**

Disclaimer: I do not own the sonic characters, just the OC's

Chapter Nine: Sky Troops

It has been a single day since Eggman suffered the humiliation defeat he recieved from Shadow and it only got worse after that. Soon after Eggman had recovered from the battle, he found that his computer database had been hacked by an unknown intruder. Now, Eggman was standing in the computer room with his robots, watching as the Black Arms were facing off against the G.U.N. soldiers in Westopolis through his computer monitors.

"Those idiots! They're destroying everything! How can I take over the city and build the Eggman Empire, if there IS no city?!" Eggman said in unimaginable rage. He slammed his fist onto the console as he continued to watch the Black Arms destroy the world he was trying to conquer. "I'm at my limit! I have no choice! Send in the Eggman Fleet. CHARGE!" Eggman commanded. The egg pawns quickly left the room to prepare for a war against the alien invaders.

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The ruins that once stood in Glyphic Canyon were now floating in the sky to serve as the Black Arms fortress. Black Doom stood beside Shadow atop the main fortress, amazed by the fact that the ruins were actually flying. "No one would ever think this place could fly." Shadow commented. "I transported this magnificent to this planet over 2000 years ago. It is the ultimate killing machine. Ready to impose terror in unimaginable ways." Black Doom said to his greatest warrior.

Black Doom looked out to the distance to find that they would soon be attacked by a fleet of red flying battleships. "Do those fools really believe they can stop me?" Black Doom said. Shadow also to notice to the flying fleet and almost instantly recognized them. "Isn't that...the doctor?" Shadow asked. "Shadow...do not fail me." Black Doom said before disappearing through the floor. "Right." Shadow said before running of to face the Eggman Fleet.

Using a speed charge he discovered, Shadow jumped to another part of the flying fortress and was greeted by Doom's Eye. "Shadow, we must rid ourselves of that idiot scientist. Use our cannons to eliminate his fleet." Black Doom. Shadow looked past Doom's Eye to find the strange alien cannon that Black Doom was talking about. Shadow took his place in the cannon and aimed it towards the first battle ship in his sight. See how the turrets were the greatest threat; Shadow destroyed them before destroying the rest of the ship.

"Well done, Shadow. Now destroy the others and rid ourselves of this insolence." Black Doom ordered. "It is done." Shadow said. Shadow found another speed charge that allowed him to jump to another area of the fortress. When he landed, Shadow found himself in front of the temple that held the main power core to the fortress. Just then, Eggman's flying television floated from one of the nearby ship to him.

"Ah, Shadow, fancy running into you here." Eggman said. "Dr. Eggman." Shadow said. "Shadow I need your help. I have detected the power source of the black alien fortress inside this temple. I need you to destroy it for me." Eggman said to him. "He will do no such thing." Black Doom said as his eye floated in front of Eggman's TV. "So, you must be the one manipulating Shadow to do your dirty work." Eggman said. "Manipulating?" Shadow said confused.

"Shadow, you must not do as he says. If you do, the entire world will be destroyed." Eggman said. "What?!" Shadow shouted in surprise. "Do not listen to him. We only seek to bring order to this world." Black Doom said to him. Shadow looked to the alien and felt confident that he was telling him the truth. "If you do what he says, you'll be breaking your promise to Maria." Eggman said. Shadow looked shocked at Eggman as his mind thought back to the promise he made to Maria. "_Shadow, Give them a chance to be happy."_

Shadow snapped out of his memory when he heard Black Doom calling out his name. "Shadow, you must choose who you will ally. Join me and I will tell you everything you wish to know about your origins." Black Doom bribed. "But if you do, you will break your promise." Eggman said. "Choose, Shadow." Black Doom said. "Choose, Shadow." Eggman continued. The two kept on pressuring Shadow until it was too much for him to take. Shadow pulled out his chaos emerald, lifted it in the air, shouting "CHAOS CONTROL" and vanished.

"No matter. With or without Shadow, the Black Arms will eliminate your forces." Black Doom said. "I don't think so. You see, I have done a little tinkering recently." Eggman said. Just, black robots jumped from the flying battle ships and onto the many parts of the Black Arms fortress. Black Doom noticed that the black robots were exact robotic copies of his soldiers. "So, you created artificial copies of my warriors." Black Doom said. "What better way to defeat an enemy then with his own self." Eggman said laughing maniacally. "Let us see which of our soldiers is superior." Black Doom said as his eye floated into the temple.

The robot aliens walked into the temple and were greeted by their original selves. "This will be over in a snap. Men, CHARGE!" Eggman commanded. Soon a battle between real and robot alien had begun. The Black Warriors decided to be the first to strike and fired their guns at their robotic copies. The problem was that the laser fire bounced off the robots armor. "What?!" Black Doom shouted in surprise. "Ha, you didn't think my robots would be destroyed that easily." Eggman said with a grin.

The robot warrior extracted their metal claws and charged at the originals. The Black Warrior were helpless against their robotic doppelgangers and were sliced unmercifully cut to pieces. With the Black Arms no longer able to stop them, the robot aliens walked up to the green stone core and loaded their guns to fire. But as they were about to fire, a gigantic black hand popped out of the ground and grabbed the nearest robot and crushed it.

"What?!" Eggman yelled in surprise. "Behold the greatest of the Black Arms, the Black Oak." Black Doom introduced. After Black Doom introduced it, a gigantic Black Warrior appeared from the ground. Unlike the real Black Warriors, the Black Oak were larger and more muscular. "Don't just stand there. FIRE!" Eggman commanded. The robot aliens open fired at the giant, but their guns had no effect on it. The Black raised it fists and brought them down hard to crush its opponent and continued to do so until there were none left.

"As you can see, doctor, the Black Arms are unstoppable." Black Doom said. Eggman had realized that no matter how many robots he would send, they would not stand a chance against this new warrior. All had seemed hopeless for the doctor until a black blur went straight through the Black Oak. The Black Oak looked down to see a hole through it chest before dropping dead. Black Doom and Eggman looked to the stone core to see Shadow standing before it.

"Shadow, what have you done?! Do you realized what you are doing?!" Black Doom said, outraged by Shadow's actions. "I know exactly what I am doing. I am keeping my promise to Maria." Shadow said. Shadow turned back to face the green stone core of the fortress. Shadow pulled back his fist before sending it slamming into the core, destroying it. "NO!" Black Doom yelled. "Now only one left to go." Shadow said as he raised his chaos emerald into the air. "CHAOS CONTROL!" Shadow shouted and disappeared.

A few miles away, Shadow had appeared again on another part of the fortress. But when Shadow touched the ground, he found himself surrounded by every known type of Black Arms imaginable. Then, Doom's Eye floated above him and said "This is your last chance Shadow. Join us and we shall being prosperity to the planet." Black Doom offered. "Never." Shadow replied. "Very well. You shall perish along with this planet." Black Doom said before his eye floated away.

The Black Arms soldier readied themselves to pounce on the traitorous hedgehog. "It is a very bad idea to fight against me." Shadow said as he pulled out the white and green chaos emeralds. Shadow crossed his arms with the emerald in hand and began to glow red like the last two times he did this attack. The Black Arms jumped onto Shadow and completely cover him with their bodies. But then the words "CHAOS BLAST" were heard and a gigantic explosion not only destroyed the Black Arms, but the entire area as well.

With the stone cores no longer able to provide energy, the entire Black Arms fortress fell from the sky. Along with the fortress, Shadow plummeted to the Earth as well. Amazingly, he though Shadow used his chaos blast, he still had enough strength to move. Shadow held up his green chaos emerald and shouted "CHAOS CONTROL!" and disappeared.

* * *

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	10. Death Ruins

**SHADOW THE HEDGEHOG**

Disclaimer: I do not own the sonic characters, just the OC's

Chapter Ten: Death Ruins

In a flash of light, Shadow fell from the air to the ground, on his back. "Ugh. Where am I now?" Shadow asked himself, while tending to his aching back. After taking a few moments to let the pain side, Shadow got up onto his feet and scanned his surroundings. The chaos control that Shadow used seems to have landed him into a dense jungle that surprisingly had many ruins in the trees. "Wonder how I got here. No matter. I just need a way out of here." Shadow said.

Shadow was ready to run off until something or someone fell from the sky and landed on him. "Can't say I saw that coming." Shadow said. Shadow pushed the person off of him and got back on his feet again. Shadow looked back to find that the person was his old ally, Rouge the Bat. Rouge was rubbing her sore head when she looked up to Shadow. "Oh Shadow, what are you doing here?" Rouge asked as got back to her feet. "I could ask you the same thing." Shadow replied

"The G.U.N soldiers have driven the black aliens back into this jungle. They called me to help them round up the last ones." Rouge told him. "Exactly how many are left?" Shadow asked. "Only ten of them. Why do you ask?" questioned Rouge. "Those things disgust me. I want to make sure they all get what's coming to them." Shadow replied. "Whatever. Come on, let's go." Rouge said as she flew into the air with Shadow following her on the ground.

* * *

After exploring the jungle for a little while, Shadow and Rouge found two gun soldiers being pinned down by three Black Warriors. "These humans can't do anything themselves." Shadow said silently. Shadow used his super speed to pick up the G.U.N. soldiers and transport them to a safe place. After placing the G.U.N. soldiers in a safe location, Shadow returned to face the enemy aliens. "Alright you black freaks, you're through." Shadow said.

The Black Warriors grabbed their guns and fired them at ebony black hedgehog. Shadow found it very simple to dodge the shots with his super speed. While he was running from the alien fire, Shadow just suddenly disappeared. The Black Warriors looked around confused to where Shadow might be. Just then, Shadow appears out of nowhere and strikes one of the Black Warriors over the head and kicks another across the face.

Shadow landed on his feet and looked at the two knocked out Black Warriors. "Pathetic creatures. Did you really think you stood a chance against me?" Shadow said. Unknown to Shadow, one Black Warrior remained standing. The Black Warrior silently walked up behind Shadow and aimed its gun to the back of his head. The Black Warrior was about to fire from behind Shadow until.

"SCREW KICK" was heard. Out of nowhere, Rouge delivered her signature move on the Black Warriors chest. Shadow heard the attack and looked back to see Rouge standing on top of the knocked out alien. "You better be more careful. We wouldn't want anything to happen to our little Shadow" Rouge said in a baby voice. Shadow was clearly annoyed by Rouge and just walked away to get rid of the other Black Arms soldiers.

* * *

After a long trek through the jungle, Shadow and Rouge had met up with another group of two Black Warriors and a Black Annelid. "We've already defeated three of them. That leaves us with only seven more left to beat." Rouge stated. "Whatever the odds, I will take them all." Shadow said as he charged at the Black Arms group. 

The Black Warriors started things off by charging at Shadow and Rouge with their black swords. Rouge flew up into the air to avoid the Black Warriors assault. "Better luck next time." Rouge said mockingly. To her surprise, the Black Warrior jumped high into the air and bashed her over the head to send her to the ground. Rouge looked up to see the Black Warrior bring his sword up and send it straight down on the helpless bat. Rouge closed her eyes in fear and waited for the aliens attack to strike. It never did.

Rouge opened her eyes to find Shadow holding one Black Warrior by the back of its neck and his fist in the others guts. Shadow moved his fist away to let the Warriors body to hit the ground and threw the other on top of it. Shadow grabbed Rouge by her arm to help her get back on to her feet. "You better be careful. We would want anything to happen to our little Rouge" Shadow said, repeating the joke Rouge said earlier. Rouge only replied with a loud "Humph."

While they were too busy with their conversation, the missing Black Annelid decided to pop out of the ground and attack the two from behind. Shadow and Rouge were able to land on their feet after the attack and watched as the Black Annelid burrowed underground again. "Where is it?" Rouge asked. "Anywhere it wants to be." Shadow replied. Time had seemed to have stopped as the pair waited for any signs of where their worm enemy might be. Shadow closed his eye to focus on the environment around him and listen in on everything above and below ground.

The Black Annelid popped out of the ground behind them and attacked the duo. Rouge saw this and moved out of the way, but Shadow was still standing in the same place. "Shadow!" Rouge yelled, but it was too late. Shadow opened his eyes and looked up to see the Black Annelid before being consumed by it. After the Black Annelid had devoured Shadow, it burrowed underground again. "Shadow...no." Rouge said as she collapsed to her knee and began to cry for her fallen comrade.

While Rouge was crying, three more Black Warrior jumped down from the trees and landed behind the sobbing bat. Hearing them hit the ground, Rouge got back to her feet and turned to face them. Rouge tried to fly away but one of the Black Warriors shot her wing and prevented her from escaping. The three Black Warriors aimed their guns and readied themselves to fire, but stopped when they noticed a yellow circle form under their feet.

"CHAOS SPEAR" was heard from below. The yellow circle soon turned into a hundred small arrows and shot straight through the Black Warriors bodies, killing them insteantly. "What the?" Rouge said, stunned by the sudden rescue. Just then, the Black Annelid that had eaten Shadow fell from the sky and landed in front of Rouge, dead. Standing on top of the dead worm was Shadow, still alive. Sticky, but alive. "Oh, thank goodness. You had me worried there, Shadow" Rouge said. Shadow only replied with a small smirk. Shadow then noticed Doom's Eye flying through the jungle and decided to chase it, leaving Rouge very confused.

* * *

After chasing Doom's Eye through the jungle, the two final stop inside the old ruins. "Having a little trouble with those G.U.N. agents...are we?" Shadow said. "What a pitiful bunch." Black Doom said. "What did you say?" Shadow said, angry. "Do you not understand, Shadow. We're not here to exterminate these poor creatures. On the contrary..." Black Doom said. Unknown to either of them, Rouge was on a high platform, listening in on their conversation. "Who is that and why is Shadow talking to him? And what are they talking about" Rouge asked herself.

"What are you saying?" Shadow asked. "All will be revealed...tomorrow." Black Doom said. "Tomorrow?" Shadow questioned. "Shadow, you should rest. You need to be ready for tomorrow's ritual." Black Doom said before his eye flew off. As soon as Doom's Eye left, a large red and black, one-eyed, flying monster appeared from the sky. "You scum. You're going down!" Shadow shouted to the monster called Black Bull.

The Black Bull took a deep breath and spit out three large fireballs at Shadow. Shadow found them easy to avoid by running away from them. When he was under the Black Bull, Shadow went into ball form and used a spin dash straight up. But the Black Bull's body was too tough and bounced Shadow away. "Great, now what?" Shadow asked himself. The Black Bull was no longer playing around. The large monster spat fire at the ground and created a large wave of fire. Shadow had his back to the wall and had nowhere to run.

Just as all hope seemed lost, Shadow felt himself being lifted into the air and safe from the wall of fire. Shadow looked up to see Rouge flying while carrying him by his shoulders. "You just can't stay out of trouble, can you?" Rouge said. "I never asked for your help." Shadow replied. "Well, if you're gonna be ungrateful about it." Rouge said as she dropped Shadow. Shadow was above of the monster and fell on top of it. As he got closer, Shadow accidentally stepped on the monsters eye before landing safely on the ground.

Shadow looked up and saw the Black Bull roar in pain and soon came up with an idea. "Rouge, that things weakness is its eye. Get me into the air so we can attack it together." Shadow said to her. "Ok." Rouge replied as she grabbed Shadow and took off into the air once more. Rouge flew them both until they were right in front of the Black Bull. "Alright Rouge, let do it!" Shadow said. "Right!" Rouge replied.

Rouge threw Shadow high above her head and while in the air, Shadow went into his ball form. As the Shadow ball fell closer to the bat, Rouge reeled back her leg. When Shadow was in front of her, Rouge delivered a powerful kick and sent Shadow straight at the Black Bull. The combined attack sent Shadow straight through the Black Bull's eye and several bumps could be seen on the monsters body as Shadow was bouncing around inside it. Finally, Shadow jumped through the Black Bull's chest and let it fall to the ground, dead.

Seeing as the fight was over, Rouge walked up to the dead Black Bull to examine it. Suddenly, her mobile communicator became active. "Rouge, can you hear me?" "Don't worry. I'm alright. I have successfully eliminated the ten remaining aliens." Rouge replied. "Good work, Rouge. Wait for back-up to arrive." "Whatever you say." Rouge replied. "Well that was quite a workout, wasn't it Shadow?" Rouge asked. No reply. Rouge looked back to see that Shadow had already left. "I got to put a tracker on that guy one of these days." Rouge said to herself.

* * *

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	11. Air Fleet

**SHADOW THE HEDGEHOG**

Disclaimer: I do not own the sonic characters, just the OC's

Chapter Eleven: Air Fleet

In the white house of Central City, the president looks out at the destruction that the Black Arms have created during their stay on the planet. The G.U.N. commander walks into the room with two soldiers. "Sir, your transport is ready. It's time to go." The commander said. "Once again...I have failed to protect our nation." The president said depressingly. The G.U.N. commander walks over to the president's desk and his eye had caught a picture on it. It was a picture of Sonic and Shadow after they defeated the Final Hazar and saved the entire world.

"Sir, it is not over yet! We can still fight. We can defeat the alien threat if we all stand together." The commander stated. The president turned to the commander and also stared at the picture of the worlds greatest heroes. "Yes, keep the nation united. No matter what happens, we'll never surrender to these creatures. That much I learned from them." The president said before he left with the two soldiers. "Soon, the black creatures will feel their own bloody Hell!" the commander said in rage.

* * *

Outside of the white house, an army of Black Arms soldiers were charging at it, most, likely trying to kill the president. G.U.N. soldiers were doing the best they could, but they stood no chance against the alien army. Just as the Black Arms were about to charge into the white house, a yell came from within the mass of warriors. "CHAOS BLAST!!!" and over a hundred Black Arms soldier were killed in a blast of red light. The rest of the army looked over to find Shadow standing in the middle of the battle zone. "Come and get me, you alien freaks." Shadow challenged.

The remaining thousand charged at Shadow with guns, swords and anything else they could find. One warrior attacked Shadow with a black sword, but Shadow jumped off the blade and kicked it over the head. Another warrior shot its gun at him, but Shadow grabbed another warrior to block the shot and threw him and the other. On and on, Shadow kept fighting for his life as the soldiers kept coming and Shadow was becoming exhausted. "There is too many for me to handle. I have failed." Shadow said as he fell to his knees.

As all hope seemed lost for Shadow, but then he was snapped out sorrowful state by a voice from the sky. "Shadow!" Shadow looked to the sky and saw Tails piloting the Tornado II straight towards him. "Shadow, grab on quickly!" Tails shouted. Tails flew the Tornado II straight through the Black Arms mass, killing as many as he could, and Shadow jumped on the wing of the plane when it got close. Once Shadow was on the wing, Tails piloted the Tornado II back into the air.

"Tails, what are you doing here?" Shadow asked. "Those black aliens are trying to kill the president. If they do that, then the entire nation will be sent into Chaos." Tails explained. "So, you're here to try and save the president." Shadow summed it up. "Right." Tails replied. The flight was going smooth until the felt themselves being hit from behind. The two looked back to see several Black Warriors riding on flying black aliens called Black Hawks.

"Exactly how many different creatures do they have?" Shadow asked to god. The Black Warriors fired their guns at the Tornado II and one shot managed to land a direct hit at the engine. "Oh no! We've been hit! We're going down!" Tails exclaimed. The Tornado II was falling at rapid speeds and Tails was doing his best to keep them from crashing into the ground. With enough hard work, Tail managed to keep the plane from hitting the ground but was now headed for the G.U.N. escape ship.

* * *

Inside the G.U.N. escape ship, the Tornado II came crashing through one of the windows and straight at the wall. The Tornado II exploded on collison, but Shadow saved them both using his super speed. "Man, that was a close one. Thanks for the save, Shadow." Tails said. "No problem, but your plane is completely destroyed." Shadow said "No worries. I can always build another one." Tails said happily. "Wow, nothing gets this kid down." Shadow thought. "Come on, let's move." Shadow said. "Right." Tails replied as they walked deeper into the G.U.N. ship.

Once inside, Shadow and Tails found several Black Arms soldiers had managed to sneak aboard the ship without being detected by the secrurity. "How did they get inside the ship without setting off the alarm system?" Tails asked. "I don't know how and I don't really care. The only thing that matters is getting rid of them!" Shadow shouted to his ally. Shadow left Tails in his dust as he charged at the stowaway aliens.

The Black Warriors were alerted of Shadow's presence when they heard him yelling to Tails. The Black Warriors formed a line and fire their guns all at the same time. Shadow knew he couldn't dodge them by moving to the side, so he slid under them instead. After avoiding the gun shots, Shadow jumped into the air and changed into his ball form. Once in his ball form, Shadow used his homing attack on the alien's heads to knock them out. "This is just too easy. You would think the Black Arms would put up more of a fight." Shadow said.

Shadow looked around and noticed that Tails was missing. "Great, were did that kid run off to now?" Shadow asked. "Shadow, over here!" Tails shouted. Shadow looked over to find Tails standing in front of a corridor that led to another sector of the ship. Shadow ran over to the two-tailed fox and asked "What's wrong, Tails?" "Shadow, the president is being attacked by the black aliens just down this corridor. G.U.N. is doing everything they can, but they don't stand a chance." Tails explained. Once he knew what was going on, Shadow ran down the corridor with Tails flying close behind.

The G.U.N. commander and soldiers were doing their best to protect the president as were trying to reach the presidents plane. "Don't worry, sir. We have everything under control." The commander said as he shot down another Black Warrior. No matter how many Black Arms soldier they took down, there were still too many to take. Slowly, one by one, the G.U.N. soldier were being killed until there was only the commander and the president. "What we need now is a miracle." The president said.

One Black Warrior was about to fire on the president until Shadow shot straight through its chest using spin dash. Shadow and Tails now stood between the Black Arms and the president. "What are you doing here?!" the commander said with malice. "That's the thanks I get for saving you life?" Shadow asked. "Mr. President, you need to get out of here fast." Tails informed. "I will. But before I go, please take this." The president said. The president reached for something in his pocket and threw it at Shadow. Shadow caught it and looked into his hand to see that it was a light-blue chaos emerald.

"I believe this will help you on your mission, Shadow." The president said. "Thank, sir." Shadow said to the president. The president nodded his head and ran into the plane to escape. The commander was hesitant at first, but soon followed the president into the plane. "Tails, I want you to go with them." Shadow said to the young fox. "But why?" Tails asked. "Just trust me." Shadow said. Tails didn't want to leave but realized that Shadow has never let him down before. Tails nodded his head and ran into the president's plane.

Shadow watched as the plane and its passengers left the G.U.N. escape ship. Shadow took another look around himself and found that he was surrounded by the Black Arms again. But instead of panicking, Shadow smirked as the five chaos emeralds he collected floated around him. "If I can destroy an entire temple with only two emeralds. Imagine what I can do with five." Shadow said to himself. The Black Arms advanced further to the black hedgehog and prepared to kill him for good this time.

Gathering all the negative energies of the chaos emerald, Shadow's body was wrapped in a great red light. "Come and get me!" Shadow stated with confidence. Soon, all the Black Warriors, Oaks and Hawks jumped on Shadow and crushed him with their combined weight. "CHAOS BLAST!!!" Shadow shouted as all of the negative energies were released from his body and exploded.

* * *

The president and Tails looked out the window and saw that the entire ship was enveloped in a gigantic red explosion. "I hope Shadow is alright." Tails said, concerned. "I am sure he is alright." The president said to his young friend. In the cockpit, the commander smiled as he watched the ship explode. "Good riddance, you monster" the commander said silently. Suddenly he heard a loud clank coming from the nose of the plane. He looked out the window to see Shadow standing on it, perfectly fine.

"What? But...how? How did you survive?!" the commander yelled in anger. Shadow looked back at the commander and, even though he couldn't hear him, he could tell what he was saying. "I don't know what you have against me, but we will have to finish this some other time." Shadow said as he lifted his newly acquired chaos emerald. "CHAOS CONTROL!" Shadow shouted before he disappeared again. "Damn you, Shadow the Hedgehog." The commander yelled in anger.

* * *

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	12. The ARK Again

**SHADOW THE HEDGEHOG**

Disclaimer: I do not own the sonic characters, just the OC's

Chapter Twelve: The ARK Again

Shadow was found walking through a deep forest outside Central City. Shadow's mind was uneasy because of all that had happen over the past few days. Shadow had helped Sonic and his friends save the world more the once. But he has also helped Black Doom and Eggman try to conquer it. He was confused on whom's to side one and one memory of Black Doom made the pressure worse. "What am I going to do? I want to help my friends, but if I do, Black Doom may not reveal the secrets of my origins. Why must this be so difficult?" Shadow thought.

He continued to walk through the forest until a circle of light surrounds him. "What the?" Shadow said in surprise. Soon the circle spreads itself and Shadow finds himself hovering in the Earth's atmosphere. "Shadow. You have not been following orders lately." Black Dooms said as he appeared from behind. "I told you, I am going to keep my promise to Maria. So just back off." Shadow said. "You made a promise to the girl. But do you remember who it was that killed her?" Black Doom asked. Shadow didn't reply because he knew the answer to the question.

Black Doom floated closer to Shadow and placed his hand on the hedgehogs shoulder. "It was the humans that did it. The humans killed your friend, Maria." Black Doom said. Shadow looked away as he remembered the day Maria was shot by one of the G.U.N. soldiers 50 years ago. "Not only did they kill the girl, but they have also defiled your home as well. Take a look." Black Doom said as both of them turned around to face Shadow's old home, Space Colony: ARK.

It had been over a month since Shadow saved the world by destroying the ARK's most powerful weapon, the Eclipse Cannon. After taking a good look, Shadow saw that everything, even the Eclipse Cannon, on the ARK had been repaired. "The ARK. But how can it be?" Shadow asked Black Doom. "The humans have repaired it and now use it as a base for their military operations" Black Doom said.

"What?" Shadow asked. "Yes, the humans have defiled the sacred ARK and now use it as a weapon of war. If that weapon were in our hands, it would be used to bring prosperity to the world." Black Doom said. "Then consider it done. No one ruins my home and gets away with it!" Shadow said with anger. Black Doom then summoned a Black Hawk and allowed Shadow to ride it. As Shadow rode off to the ARK, Black Doom chuckled evilly. "This is almost too easy." Black Doom said silently.

* * *

As Shadow flew the Black Hawk closer to the ARK, he noticed that many electrical barriers were surrounding it. "What are those things doing here?" Shadow asked. Then, Doom's Eye floats along side Shadow. "Those are barriers that the humans built to keep out all intruders. It would seem that the humans continue to defile your home with those barriers." Black Doom said. "Not for long." Shadow said. "Good. To get rid of the barriers, you must destroy the two defense units around the ARK." Black Doom said. "Understood." Shadow replied.

Shadow was searching for one of the defense units until he saw a laser that nearly hit them. Shadow looked back to find several G.U.N. beetle droids shooting at them. "Do not pay any attention to them. My soldiers will take care of them." Black Doom said. Black Doom then summoned two more Black Hawks that charged at the G.U.N. robots. The beetle constantly fired at the flying aliens, but they were too fast to hit. Soon enough, both Black Hawks flew past the robots and destroyed them.

"Not bad." Shadow complimented. After a long search, Shadow had run across an unknown machine and he could only guess was the defense unit. With the target in sight, Shadow formed over twenty yellow arrows around him. "CHAOS SPEAR!" Shadow shouted. The arrows flew past the black hedgehog and broke straight through the defense unit, causing it to create a large explosion "One down, one more to go." Shadow said.

As Shadow continued his search for the defense units, he ran into a bit of trouble when asteroids were hovering around the ARK. Shadow used another chaos spear to destroy another asteroid that was about to hit them. "These barriers can keep out intruders, but not asteroids? The humans really are as dumb as they look" Shadow said. Another asteroid was headed for their direction and Shadow was prepared to use another chaos spear. But before he could use it, the asteroid suddenly exploded without any reason. "What?" Shadow said in surprise.

Then, out of the destruction of the asteroid came G.U.N. walker that looked similar to the one Shadow fought on Prison Island over a month ago. "Target sighted. Firing cannons now." The pilot said. The walker let out a barrage of laser that Shadow was barely able to avoid. Knowing that he could win while on the Black Hawk, Shadow made a sharp turn left and headed into another direction. "You can't escape me, traitor!" The pilot yelled as he chased after Shadow.

For the first time ever, Shadow was running for his life. Shadow looked back and watched as the walker continued to follow him without giving any signs of stopping. "Shadow, look up ahead." Black Doom said. Shadow looked forward to find the second defense unit and an idea hit him. "This should be fun." Shadow said with confidence. Shadow increased the speed of the Black Hawk and headed for the defense unit. Shadow looked back to find that the walker was following him to the exact speed. The unit came closer and when Shadow was only an inch from hitting it, he jumped off the hawk to a floating safety area.

Shadow watched as the Black Hawk and the walker both crashed into the defense unit and was destroyed in the explosion. "Well done, Shadow. That was the last one. Now you must enter the ARK and activate the Eclipse Cannon." Black Doom said. "Yes, but unfortunately I don't have a way to reach it." Shadow said. Just then, a Black Hawk flew down next to Shadow. "You were saying." Black Doom said. Shadow said nothing as he jumped on the Black Hawk and rode off to the inside of the ARK.

* * *

Once inside the ARK, Shadow jumped off the Black Hawk and decided walk the rest of the way. After a peaceful walk through his old home, Shadow had reached the power core of the Eclipse Cannon. "It looks exactly the say before Sonic and I destroyed it." Shadow said. Then suddenly, a large, blue, round G.U.N. machine appeared from behind the cannon core and faced Shadow and readied itself to strike.

"ARK to Headquarters! ARK to Headquarters! Come in! Come in! Shadow has penetrated the ARK! He's headed towards the control room of the Eclipse Cannon." The pilot said over the radio. "I knew he couldn't be trusted. Blue Falcon, do whatever you can to stop him. I want you to destroy him at all costs. That is an order." The G.U.N. commander responded. "Yes, sir." the pilot said. "Alright hedgehog, prepare to be destroyed." The pilot said to Shadow.

"Foolish humans. Do they really believe they can defeat me?" Shadow said. The Blue Falcon began the battle by using the rocket launchers around its body to attack him. Shadow made no effort to move, but instead, he just swatted the rockets away like they were flies. "What? But how?" The confused pilot asked. "Have you forgotten? I am the ultimate life-form." Shadow said. "We'll just see about that." The pilot said. Soon, the Blue Falcons body started to glow light-blue "Particle beam cannon, FIRE!" the pilot shouted. A wave of light-blue energy lashed out around the entire area.

After the destruction was over, the pilot looked around to see that Shadow was no longer there. "Alright. That hedgehog is finally dead." the pilot said. "I wouldn't be too sure of that." A voice from the passenger's seat said. The pilot looked back to find that Shadow was sitting in the seat, completely unharmed. Shadow grabbed the pilot from his seat upfront and that was the last time he was ever seen alive.

* * *

All around the earth, the Black Arms destruction had stopped as Black Dooms voice filled the sky. "We are the Black Arms. We are here to take rule of this planet. Any attempts to resist are futile, and will result in death. As of today... this planet, is MINE! Annihilation for this planet is near. It is time to embrace the dawn of your demise and despair." Black Doom said

Out in space, the once destroyed Eclipse Cannon had become active. The large tower open up on the ARK and charges itself with a ray of green energy surrounding it. After a few moments the cannon fires its blast towards earth at incredible speed. The blast tears through two fleeing escape ship before colliding with the white house. The blast expands farther and completely destroys all of Central City. Black Doom's laughter could be heard from the sky.

* * *

Back on the ARK, Shadow watched in horror as the Eclipse Cannon had been fired onto his home planet. Shadow then realized that he had been tricked by Black Doom so that he could use the Eclipse Cannon on the planet. And speak of the devil, Black Doom floated behind Shadow and looked out to the planets destruction. "It is truly a beautiful sight. Wouldn't you agree, Shadow?" Black Doom said to the black hedgehog. Shadow looked to Black Doom with anger in his eyes.

"What are you doing?! You said that you would bring prosperity to the planet!" Shadow yelled at the alien leader. "We are bringing prosperity, Shadow. Only in a different way." Black Doom said to him. "By destroying the planet?! That is not prosperity, this is total destruction. You said you would protect the planet! You lied to me." Shadow said "Hmm...so I have." Black Doom said like it was no bid deal.

Shadow was now furious and lunged at the lying alien leader. But Black Doom just swatted Shadow away with a wave of his hand. Shadow was thrown to the other side of the room and felt unusually drained after a single hit. Black Doom hovered above Shadow and took the five chaos emeralds he collected. "Now I possess six chaos emeralds." Black Doom said. "Six" questioned Shadow. Black Doom revealed a red chaos emerald that most likely got from the Lethal Highway when the tank tried to escape.

"With these six chaos emerald, finding the last one with be a simple matter." Black Doom said. Shadow struggled to get on his feet and looked at Black Doom with the chaos emeralds floating around his head. "You won't get away with this Black Doom." Shadow stated. "Too late, Shadow. I already have. With the chaos emeralds in my possession, you are no longer needed." Black Doom said. "What?" Shadow said. "CHAOS CONTOL!" Black Doom shouted. And in a flash of light, Shadow had disappeared off the ARK.

* * *

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	13. GUN Fortress

**SHADOW THE HEDGEHOG**

Disclaimer: I do not own the sonic characters, just the OC's

Chapter Thirteen: G.U.N. Fortress

It had been several hour since Black Doom used the Eclipse Cannon to destroy all of Central City. The president and commander were in the G.U.N. control room, watching the destruction replay itself on the video screen. "This can't be happening." The president said silently. "Don't worry, sir. We will make those invaders pay for this." The commander said. Suddenly, the alarms begin blaring all around the base. "What is happening?" the president asked suddenly.

"Commander, over a thousand black aliens have infiltrated our fortress." One of the G.U.N. soldier reported. "WHAT!?" the president and the commander shouted together. "And that's not all. According to our reports, Shadow the Hedgehog has also been spotted inside the base." The soldier continued. "Shadow? I don't believe it." the president said in a depressing manner. Shadow's appearance with the Black Arms made it looked like he had sided with them. The commander finally saw an opportunity to get rid of the black hedgehog.

"So he's finally decided to show himself. Attention all command units! Mobilize all Mech battle sections! Prepare all weapons to strike incoming vessels! Mobilize "Diablon"!" the commander ordered. "But sir. It's not finished." The soldier replied. "I don't care! I gave you an order and I expect you to follow it!" the commander stated. "Yes, sir." The soldier said before leaving the room. "Shadow! Damn you! It's been fifty years... justice will finally be served." The commander said venomously.

* * *

Near the landing pad where the president's plane landed, Shadow was looking down at the soldiers from the higher levels of the base. Inside Shadow's mind, one sentence kept replaying itself. "_Shadow, Give them a chance to be happy." _Maria's words echoed through his mind. "Maria. Even though you were killed by them, you still want the humans to be happy. I promise I will no longer be blinded by my own wants. I will keep my promise to you, Maria." Shadow said.

Shadow heard a loud thumping sound coming from below and looked over the railing to see all the G.U.N. soldiers took their positions and aimed all their guns at the steel entrance. Large bumps started forming from the steel door and was soon broken off it hinges. The Black Arms started swarming through the door and began their assault on the base. "Open fire!" the leader shouted. Lasers and bullets were fired all across the room and bouncing everywhere. One random shot nearly took Shadow's head if he didn't move in time.

"This has gone on long enough. Time for me enter this battle." Shadow said. Shadow jumped off the railing and plummeted to the battle below. Shadow landed on one of the Black Warriors head to knock it out. Another Black Warrior fired his laser at Shadow, but he avoided and landed a strong kick to it chest. Unknown to Shadow, another Black Warrior snuck up behind him and prepared to swing its black sword on him. Shadow heard a loud clank from behind him and looked back to find the black sword on the ground and looked up to see the Black Warrior being hung by it neck by a...blue tentacle?

Shadow followed the tentacle up to a steel beam to find the former god of destruction, Chaos. "Chaos?" Shadow said in surprise. Chaos released the dead alien and jumped off the beam to land in front of Shadow. "I am so glad you are here. Shadow." A voice from behind said, startling Shadow. Shadow looked behind him to see Tikal. "Tikal, Chaos. What are you two doing here?" Shadow asked. "We knew the invaders were attacking and wanted to help." Tikal said. "It's a good thing you did. Come on let move." Shadow said. "Right" Tikal replied. The trio raced off into the deeper part of the fortress.

* * *

In the deeper part of the G.U.N. fortress, the trio found a security area surrounded by a pool of strange unknown liquid. "What is that?" Shadow asked. Chaos sticks his claw into the unknown liquid and examines it with his mind. Chaos looked back to Tikal and the water around him ripples, as if he was trying to talk. "It is liquid chaos, but it seems be different." Tikal said for Chaos "Different? How?" Shadow asked. "This liquid chaos seems to be made by the humans. It is not as pure as real chaos, nor is it as powerful." Tikal explained

While the hero trio were wrapped in their conversation about the artificial chaos, they did not notice the Black Warrior creeping up behind them. The Black Warrior held up its black sword, but clumsily tripped over broke pole, causing a loud thump. Hearing the thump, the trio looked back and found the Black Warrior on the ground, out cold. "Black Doom seriously needs some new soldiers." Shadow said. Chaos suddenly points to the pathway on the other side of the room causing the others to look over and see a large number of Black Arms. "Finally, some fun." Shadow said with a smirk.

Tikal reverted to a ball of light and flew away to avoid being caught in the battle. Many of the Black Warriors used their guns on the two remaining heroes, but dodge them in time. Shadow used his speed to get behind a few of the Black Warrior and shouted "CHAOS SPEAR" to send multiple arrows through the aliens. Chaos was surrounded by seven Black Warriors and had nowhere to run. The Black Warriors lunged themselves at Chaos, but he reverted himself into a puddle, causing the alien invaders to collide with each other.

Shadow and Chaos stood back to back as they were surrounded by over a hundred more Black Warriors. "So, got a plan?" Shadow asked. Chaos looked down for a moment and the turned his head to the artificial chaos. Chaos suddenly jumped on to one of the Black Warriors heads to bounce off another. Chaos was running on top of the aliens heads until he had reached the pool of chaos. Chaos jumped inside the pool and nothing happened. "Yeah, good plan." Shadow said sarcastically.

The Black Warrior stared at the pool for a moment before turning back to their other target: Shadow. "This is not my day." Shadow said. The Black Warriors aimed their guns at Shadow until the entire room started to shake. "What's going on?" Shadow asked. Tikal flew down next to him and said "It's Chaos." The pool of artificial Chaos erupted and began to take form. As it took form, it started to look like Chaos, only he was now twenty feet high. "That's kind of cool." Shadow said. The Chaos giant swung down its arms to pound the black aliens into dust.

When Chaos finished decimating the Black Warriors, Tikal appeared in her regular form in front of Shadow. "Shadow, more of those awful creatures are coming. You must go; we will take care of them." Tikal said. And like Tikal said, more Black Arms aliens had arriving inside the base. Shadow was hesitant at first, but he knew Chaos could handle the situation. "Thank you, Tikal. And you too, Chaos." Shadow said before running off to the center of the fortress.

* * *

Shadow had reached the center of the base and has yet to find what he was looking for. "Don't tell me G.U.N. doesn't have a way to reach the ARK. I have to get to the ARK before Black Doom uses the Eclipse Cannon again." Shadow said to himself. "So we meet again, Shadow." a voice echoed through the room. Shadow looked up to see a giant red robot with only arms and one eye. "Today, justice will be served! You will pay for what you did, Shadow!" the commander yelled from inside the robot. "Look I don't have time for this. So let's just get this over with." Shadow said calmly.

Since the red robot, Diablon, was hovering in the air, Shadow could not make any physical contact, so he had to play smart. The Diablon charged its eye and shot out a blue energy beam at Shadow. Shadow was lucky enough to avoid the blast by only an inch. "Hold still, you monster!" the commander shouted. The Diablon launched another energy beam and Shadow avoided it. Unknown to Shadow, the beam bounced off a piece of glass and managed the graze his leg. "What?" Shadow asked as he felt the hot burning pain coming from his leg.

Shadow looked at the glass that bounced the beam and quickly thought of an idea. Shadow was able to stand, even with his burned leg, and ran over the glass. "You won't get away from me!" The commander shouted. The Diablon fired another energy beam towards Shadow's direction. Thinking fast, Shadow grabbed the glass and used it to redirect the beam back at the Diablon's chest plate. The Diablon fell to the ground and deactivated since its power core was destroyed by the beam.

Shadow walked to the head and opened it up to find...no one. Shadow looked and the controls and found a small communicator next to the controls. "He must have been controlling this robot by remote." Shadow said. "That's right." The commander's voice came from behind. Shadow turned around and found the commander holding a small pistol towards his face. "It has been a long time...Shadow the Hedgehog." The commander said calmly. "Alright, enough is enough. Who are you and how do you know who I am?" Shadow questioned the commander.

"I know you... Shadow the Hedgehog. You killed everyone I loved... my family... Maria. I've been waiting all my life for this day!" the commander said. "You lair! I would never have harmed Maria!" Shadow said, outraged by the commanders saying he killed Maria. "Maria was like a sister to me. She was the only family I knew! And because of you... she was killed! Witnessing it all... the plan to create that horrifying evil creature... that black creature, and that insane professor who unleashed it all!" the commander stated.

Shadow was shocked that the commander said Black Doom might have something to do with his creation. "So...the Professor created me...with Black Doom?" Shadow asked. "You don't fool me! It's not just about Maria. Thanks to you, everyone I knew and loved was killed when the ARK was destroyed. Worst of all, my family! Finally... justice is served!" the commander shouted. The commander fired his gun on Shadow, but when he did, the black hedgehog disappeared.

"If what you say is true, then I will respectfully accept my fate." Shadow said behind the commander with his back turned towards him. The commander was confused at why this monster would willingly die and could only think of one reason. "You didn't know any of this, did you?" the commander asked. "Please, give me a little more time to uncover the real truth." Shadow said as he walked away. The commander watch Shadow leave and silently said "Good luck, Shadow the Hedgehog."

* * *

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	14. Lava Shelter

**SHADOW THE HEDGEHOG**

Disclaimer: I do not own the sonic characters, just the OC's

Chapter Fourteen: Lava Shelter

After the defeat of the G.U.N. commander, Shadow spent his time in the base looking for a way to reach the ARK. Unfortunately, the only space crafts they had were destroyed when the Black Arms attacked. Seeing as how G.U.N. could not help him, he had only one person to turn to: Dr. Eggman. Shadow had not seen Eggman personally since the entire Cryptic Castle incident and knew that he would be hiding in a new location.

Lucky for him, Shadow has had someone keeping track of Eggman's movements ever since he was released from suspended animation on Prison Island. But in the current time, he wishes he hadn't. The person he had keep track of Eggman was...Kumori. Shadow knew that if he went to Kumori, she would reveal his location in exchange for him going out on a date with her. He really didn't want to go out on a date with his prototype. But right now, he didn't have a choice. With his mind made up, Shadow raced off to Station Square.

Shadow stood atop one of the buildings in the city and looked down to the streets. By the looks of it, the Black Arms have attacked this city too. But the damage was not as extensive as the former Central City. Even though she was a hedgehog among humans, it wasn't going to be easy to find Kumori. Then suddenly, out of nowhere come a pair of arms that wrap around Shadow and crush him. Shadow knew that those arms could only belong to Kumori.

"Oh, Shadow! I missed you so much!" Kumori screamed. The screaming was hurting Shadow's ears because she was only an inch from him. After taking a moment, Shadow released himself from Kumori's hold and looked at her with a serious expression. "Listen Kumori, I don't have time for this. I need to know where Eggman is hiding right now." Shadow said. "Aww, aren't you even going to say hello. You take things way to seriously." Kumori said. "You don't understand. Eggman is the only person who can help me get to the ARK. So do you know where he is or not?" Shadow questioned.

See that Shadow was serious about this, Kumori decided to give in. "Alright, I'll tell you. But only on one condition." Kumori said. "Here we go" Shadow said in his mind. As Shadow predicted, Kumori was going to ask for a date. "You have to take me with you." Kumori said. "I already told you the answer is—what?" Shadow said, surprised that Kumori didn't ask him for a date. "You're probably wondering why I didn't ask for a date, right?" Kumori asked. Shadow nodded his head, still in shock.

"You want to get to the ARK so you can get to those aliens, right." Kumori asked. Shadow nodded his head again. "I agree that those aliens need to be stopped, which means there is no time for a date. We have to put an end to those aliens reign." Kumori said. "Finally, you're talking sense." Shadow said. "And then we can go on a date." Kumori continued, causing Shadow to groan. Kumori ran off with Shadow following behind, headed towards Eggmans base.

* * *

After running over a hundred miles, Shadow and Kumori stop at the base of an active volcano. "Are you telling me that Eggman's base is inside this volcano?" Shadow asked. "Yep, pretty much." Kumori said. "Why can't the doctor ever pick someplace normal to build a base?" Shadow asked himself. "Maybe he doesn't like neighbors." Kumori said. Shadow looked at Kumori like she was crazy. Seeing Shadow's expression, Kumori said "What? It could be a possibility." "Never mind, let's go." Shadow said as they both ran into the secret entrance of the base.

Shadow and Kumori were now standing on a platform that was being held up by the lava below them. The heat of the place was intense. Even Shadow could be seen losing his cool. "How does...Eggman survive...in a place like this?" Kumori asked panting from the heat. "Who knows? But we have to keep moving. We don't want to stay in one place too long." Shadow said. Shadow and Kumori trudged through the blazing base, hoping to find Eggman before they were boiled alive.

The two black hedgehogs walked around the base, too hot to run, and have found absolutely no sign of Eggman anywhere inside. Finally, Kumori collapses to the ground from severe dehydration. "Kumori, are you ok?" Shadow asked. Kumori did her best to move, but she had no strength left in her body. "No, I can't move." Kumori said. Shadow tried to walk over and help her, but collapsed from dehydration as well. Shadow took one last look at Kumori before his vision went black.

* * *

One hour later, Shadow woke up and felt surprisingly cool. Shadow looked around and found that he had been moved to a new location. Shadow got up to his feet and examined his new surroundings. It looked like he was still in the volcano, only the area was cooled by a large ventilation system. Shadow continued to scan the area until he spotted Kumori on the ground a few feet away from him. "Kumori!" Shadow yelled with concern. Shadow ran over to Kumori's side and grabbed her in his arms.

Shadow shook Kumori, trying to wake her up. "Kumori! Kumori! Wake up!" Shadow shouted. After a few seconds, Kumori's eyes open to gaze upon Shadow. Almost instantly, Kumori wrapped Shadow into a bone-breaking hug. "Shadow. I was so worried that you were hurt." Kumori said. "I will if you don't let go." Shadow said choked out. Kumori let go of Shadow and got back up to her feet. "Where are we?" Kumori asked. "I don't know." Shadow replied. "Why, you two are in the center of my base." A familiar voice came from above

Suddenly, a four-legged red robot with three slots dropped down in front of the black hedgehogs. "Doctor?" Shadow said. "Shadow, Kumori. What are you two doing here?" Eggman questioned. "Doctor, we need to use one of your space crafts to reach the ARK." Shadow said. "Not a chance. You see, those aliens need the seven chaos emeralds to complete their plans. And as long as I have my own chaos emerald, nothing can stop me." Eggman said. "You have a chaos emerald?" Shadow asked. "Yes and I will use it to destroy you with my greatest creation, the Egg Dealer." Eggman said.

The slots on the Egg Dealer started spinning until they stopped on three missile signs. "Ha-ha, prepare for missile fever." Eggman said. Then, missiles launched out of the sides of the Egg Dealer and headed towards Shadow and Kumori. Using their speed, Shadow and Kumori avoided the missiles and ran towards the Egg Dealer. Shadow jumped into the air and used a homing attack on Eggman, but was sent back by an invisible barrier around Eggman.

"Ugh, damn him." Shadow swore. While Shadow was busy fighting Eggman, Kumori noticed that the slots were still spinning and when they matched, the Egg Dealer would launch an attack at Shadow. So what would happen if Shadow used them instead? "Shadow, try and use those slots against Eggman!" Kumori yelled. Shadow took notice that there were three buttons under each slot and thought they the key to stopping the slots. "This better work or you're dead, Kumori!" Shadow yelled.

When Shadow wasn't looking, Eggman landed another row of missiles signs and launched them at him. Shadow saw the missiles out of the corner of his eye and nearly avoided them with his super speed. After avoiding the missiles, Shadow jumped into the air and used a homing attack on the three buttons of the Egg Dealer. After hitting the buttons three times, three picture of Shadow appeared on the slots. "No! Not Shadow fever! Why did I put that one in anyway?" Eggman said.

Shadow felt an unusual amount of energy enter his body and recognized this familiar sensation. This was the same sensation he felt whenever he used his chaos blast. "You made a big mistake challenging me, Eggman." Shadow said. Shadow's body was wrapped in a red glow light. Shadow ran under the Egg Dealer and released all the stored chaos energy. "CHAOS BLAST!!!" Shadow yelled. The blast completely destroyed the Egg Dealer, but allowed Eggman to survive. During the blast, the chaos emerald was shot out of the Egg Dealer and was caught by Shadow.

Eggman groaned as he sat up and rubbed his aching head. Shadow walked over to Eggman and surprisingly offered a hand to Eggman to help the doctor up. Eggman was hesitant at first, but accepted the offer and was back on his feet. "I guess you beat me fair and square, Shadow." Eggman said. "Doctor, we need to use one of your space crafts to reach the ARK. Allow us to use one, please." Shadow said. "Give me one reason why I should." Eggman said. "The ARK was built by your grandfather, Eggman. I would have expected you to hold it sacred since you looked up to him." Shadow said.

Shadow got Eggman that time. All his life, Eggman always looked up to his grandfather as a hero and respected him. And now his grandfather's greatest creation was being used by aliens bent on destroying the world. There was no way he was going to stand for that. "Alright, you convinced me! Let's get out there and destroy those alien thieves!" Eggman shouted. "So you'll let us use your space craft?" Shadow asked. "I would, but I don't have any." Eggman said. "Great. The 'genius' was too stupid to build a space ship." Kumori complained.

Shadow was officially out of ideas. Since neither G.U.N. nor Eggman had any way of getting to the ARK, the entire world was doomed. Just as the trio was about to give up hope, they heard what sounded like rocket engines. The trio looked up to see a red round space shuttle with Sonic standing on top of it. "Hey, Shadow. What's happening?" Sonic called out. "Sonic? How did you find us?" Shadow asked.

The window of the shuttles cockpit lowered to reveal Tails in the pilot's seat. "That's easy. I placed a tracking device on your quill when we helped the president escape." Tails said. Shadow checked his quills and pulled out a small square chip, just like Tails said. "You're good, kid" Shadow complimented. "Looks like those black creatures are headed out to space. they're on their way to the ARK, so I guess that means we're going too! So hurry up. Next stop, the ARK." Sonic said.

The shuttle lowed itself so that Shadow and the others could enter inside. Shadow and Kumori entered the shuttle with Eggman followed close behind them. "Hey! What's he doing here!?" Knuckles voice came from the back. Shadow looked around the shuttle and saw the entire hero gang onboard. "Looks like the whole gang is here." Shadow said in his mind. "He is coming with us. He could be of some use later." Shadow said. "buckle your seatbelts everyone because were off." Tails said from the pilot's seat. The shuttle changed it direction and flew off into the sky, towards Space Colony: ARK.

* * *

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	15. Cosmic Fall

**SHADOW THE HEDGEHOG**

Disclaimer: I do not own the sonic characters, just the OC's

Chapter Fourteen: Cosmic Fall

The shuttle that carried the heroes inside was traveling at a slow pace to avoid being detected by the Black Arms. Inside, the heroes were planning a stage of attack against Black Doom. "How do we even know that this "Black Doom" is even still on the ARK?" Knuckles asked. "He presents an excellent point. There is a chance that Black Doom could be expecting us to attack." Eggman said. "Then it is a chance we will have to take. We have to make sure the Eclipse Cannon is no longer under the control of the Black Arms or Black Doom." Shadow said.

A few moments later, the space shuttle landed at the flight deck of the ARK without a problem. The large group of heroes tried to exit the shuttle, but Shadow accidentally ran into an unknown person upon exiting. Shadow and the unknown person were knocked down to the ground and Shadow looked up to see the new arrival. The new person looked to be a large green crocodile with red spikes going down his back. The crocodile wore grey headphones, a golden chain around his neck, black cuffs with golden buckles and black and white sneakers. The Sonic gang knew him as Vector the crocodile.

"Hey, guys. It's Vector. What are you doing here Vector?" Sonic asked. Vector sat up and looked at the group, surprised that they were here on the ARK. "Hey guys, Great to see ya. I'm here doing some under cover work for Team Chaotix." Vector said as he got back to his feet. "Great, another one." Shadow said sarcastically in his mind. Shadow remembered when he ran into the other members of Team Chaotix, Charmy and Espio. Shadow was surprised that he didn't kill Charmy, but he respected Espio.

"What are you doing, Vector." Cream asked. "I'm trying to find the computer room to this place, but I'm lost." Vector admitted. "There's a surprise." Knuckles said sarcastically. Out of everyone, Shadow seemed the most interested in Vector's mission. "First Charmy took those top secret disks from Prison Island. Then Espio stole the data from Eggman's computer. Now this guy wants to extract the data from the computer room. Maybe the data they took hold the secrets of my origin." Shadow thought

"I shall take you to the computer room" Shadow said out loud. Everyone looked at Shadow, surprised that he would give this kind of offer to someone he didn't know. "Are you sure, Shadow?" Rouge asked. "I am the only one that knows where it is. Besides, he looks like he could use our help." Shadow explained. "But what about Black Doom." Tails asked. "It would be a good idea if we split up into groups of two. Sonic and Eggman, Rouge and Knuckles, Kumori and Mach, Tails and Cream, Chaos and Tikal. You will be those groups. Search every inch of the ARK for Black Doom." Shadow explained. "Got it." everyone said.

The Five groups ran to different directions while Shadow turned to face Vector. "So, where is the computer room?" Vector asked impatiently. "If you want to find it, then try to keep up." Shadow said. Shadow ran of into another direction, leaving Vector in his dust. "Hey! Wait for me!" Vector yelled as he ran after Shadow.

* * *

Shadow and Vector walked into a room that was built as a bridge with glowing blue ooze beneath it. Remembering the time at the G.U.N. base, Shadow knew it was artificial liquid chaos. "Why would there be liquid chaos onboard the ARK?" Shadow asked in his mind as he looked down from the bridge. Vector looked back and noticed that Shadow had stopped walking as was looking at the strange ooze. "Hey Shadow, hurry up. We don't have all day." Vector said as he continued walking. Vector soon stopped walking when he ran into something that felt wet.

Vector looked up and saw a round blue blob with tentacles and a metal head shaped like Chaos. Upon seeing the creature, Vector let out a loud scream of surprise and ran next to Shadow. "This must be another one of the professor's experiments." Shadow thought. The fake Chaos enlarged its tentacles and aimed them at Shadow and Vector. Shadow jumped out of the way while Vector tripped on his own two feet to avoid the attack. When Shadow was over the fake Chaos head he yelled out "CHAOS SPEAR!" and sent several yellow arrows at the fake.

Unfortunately, since the attack was made from chaos energy, the fake Chaos absorbed the attack and grew larger. "What!?" Shadow yelled in surprise. The fake Chaos then wrapped its tentacle around Shadow and lifted him off the ground. The fake Chaos began to squeeze the life out of Shadow. All had seemed hopeless until Vector jumped from out of nowhere and snapped his jaws onto the fake Chaos mechanicl head. The fake body reverted back into its ooze form and allowed Shadow a chance to escape.

Vector walked over to Shadow with the fake Chaos head in his mouth and spit it out. "Oh, that was nasty." Vector said as he pulled out a bar of soap from nowhere and scrubbed his tongue with it. "This guy is even stranger then Sonic. And that's saying something." Shadow thought. "I guess I owe you one." Shadow said. "Yes, you do." Vector stated. "Then allow me to show you the _real _way to the computer room." Shadow said. "What? You were leading me in the wrong direction?" Vector asked in surprise. "Actually, I was hoping I would lose you. Now come on." Shadow said as he ran off with Vector following.

* * *

After taking the real path to the computer room, Shadow and Vector found themselves in a room with three floating sections and toxic waste underneath them. "At the end of this room, the computer room is there." Shadow said as he pointed to the door across the room. "But I suggest you let me take you across." Shadow said. "How come?" Vector asked. Vector walked closer to the floating sections and jumped to it until Shadow pulled him back. As Shadow pulled him back, a large energy beam shot up and nearly killed Vector. "That's why." Shadow said to his shaking ally.

"So, how do you plan on getting us across?" Vector asked. Shadow then pulled out the purple chaos emerald that he obtained from Eggman and showed it to Vector. "Hang on." Shadow said as he grabbed Vector's arm. Shadow raised his chaos emerald and Shouted "CHAOS CONTROL!" Shadow and Vector disappeared and reappeared on the other side of the room. "Why didn't you do that at the beginning?" Vector questioned. "You never asked." Shadow replied before walking into the room.

Shadow and Vector walked through the door and entered a room with large, green, electronic towers with a small control panel in the center. "Wow! This place is huge!" Vector shouted. Shadow scanned the room but suddenly stopped when he heard a familiar annoying voice. "Shadow!" "Oh no." Shadow said silently. Shadow turned around for a moment before being slammed to the ground by Charmy. "Shadow, you're here! Yay! Now you can give me my autograph!" Charmy Shouted.

Lucky for Shadow, Espio came from behind the bee and lifted him into the air by his wings. "Charmy. Do not be rude to our ally." Espio said. "Aww." Charmy complained. Shadow got back up to his feet and stared at his old allies. "What are you doing here?" Shadow asked. "We were heading towards the computer room when Vector somehow got lost." Espio explained. "I'm here now aren't I?" Vector said. "Indeed." Espio said. "Well, good luck with whatever you are doing. If you find anything, let me know." Shadow said. "Will do." Vector replied. Shadow held his chaos emerald and used chaos control to teleport away.

* * *

Shadow's chaos control teleported him to the same place he started this whole crazy adventure. Just then, the five groups had returned to the spot and looked disappointed. Except for Mach, he is wearing a helmet. "What happened?" Shadow asked. "Nothing, that's what." Knuckles replied. "It looks like the Black Arms left this place a while ago. They didn't leave trace of where they might be going." Tails says. Shadow was confused. Where could the Black Arms be if they weren't on Earth or the ARK?

Then, Sonic looks up to the sky to see a large comet wrapped in flames. "Hey guy, look." Sonic said to the group as he pointed to the comet. Shadow looks at the comet and asks "What is that?" "That is the Black Comet. Once every 50 years, it passes by the planet." Mach explained. "Hey. I remember seeing that comet when Professor Gerald was creating Shadow. Do you think there is a connection between the two?" Kumori said. "Black...Comet?" Shadow said slowly.

Just then, Shadow fell to his knees and held his head in pain. "Shadow, what's wrong?" Tikal asked in concern. Shadow weakly gets back to his feet and looks to the Black Comet again. "I think you're right... I feel it... they're up there. That's where the answers are... I've got to get to that Comet!" Shadow exclaimed. Shadow pulled out his chaos emerald and shouted "CHAOS CONTROL!" and with that, the entire group was teleported to their new destination: the Black Comet.

* * *

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	16. The Black Comet

**SHADOW THE HEDGEHOG**

Disclaimer: I do not own the sonic characters, just the OC's

Chapter Fifteen: The Black Comet

Thanks to the power of Shadow's chaos control, the group of heroes and Eggman were teleported inside the Black Comet. The inside of the comet was not what anyone had expected it to be. The entire place was organized, technological and made so that travel through the comet would be simple for anyone. "The Black Arms are more advanced then I had first thought they were." Eggman said out loud. "But which way do we go now?" Tails asked.

While everyone was busy choosing a path to take, Shadow saw Black Doom's Eye floating down one of the passageways. "So which way do you think we should go, Shadow?" Sonic asked his counterpart. Sonic received no response from Shadow. "Shadow?" Sonic asked once again. The group looked back to find that Shadow had already left. "Aw man. He ditched us." Sonic complained.

A while ago, Shadow started chasing Doom's Eye down the passageway, leaving the others behind. After a long run, Shadow had lost the trail of Doom's Eye. "Damn. Where did that thing float off to now?" Shadow asked himself. Just then, a large hologram of Black Doom appeared to Shadow. "I see you have made it this far, Shadow." Black Doom said. "That's right, Black Doom. I will end your plan of destroying the world, now!" Shadow proclaimed. Black Doom only laughed at Shadow's proclamation of stopping him.

"If you think you can stop me. Then prove it. You will find me at the center of the comet. But first you must defeat my elite warriors before you can face me." Black Doom challenged. "I will defeat any challenge you give me." Shadow said, accepting Black Doom's challenge. "Then this is your chance to prove your worth." Black Doom said before his hologram disappeared. When the hologram disappeared, Shadow was now faced with a new passageway and he ran down it.

* * *

The passageway had lead Shadow to a large circular room with no way out. "Why would he bring me here?" Shadow asked. Shadow then heard a loud rumbling sound and looked back to see that the passageway he entered was now blocked off. "He tricked me." Shadow said. Black Dooms hologram appeared above Shadow again. "If you wish to leave this room, then you must survive the battle against my elites. Good luck." Black Doom said, chuckling as his hologram disappeared.

Shadow scanned the room and found no way in or out of it. So how could Shadow fight his elites if they couldn't enter the room? Suddenly, Shadow was hit in the back by, what felt like, a laser blast. Shadow collapsed to his knees and looked back to see no one there. "What?" Shadow asked himself. He was once again hit by another laser to the shoulder and fell to the ground on his face. "What is going on here?" Shadow asked himself.

A flash of gold light appeared in front of Shadow and started to take form. Shadow looked up to see a Black Warrior wearing yellow armor on its body. Shadow knew this was Black Doom's elite warrior, the Black Assassin. A second later, six more Black Warriors appeared, each of them was wearing a different colored armor. The seven wearing green, white, blue, red, yellow, purple and light-blue armor, most likely representing the seven chaos emeralds.

The yellow assassin aimed its gun at Shadow's forehead and at the last second, Shadow rolled to the side to avoid the laser. Shadow got back on to his feet and faced the Black Assassins. The Black Assassins disappeared in a flash of light. "They're using Chaos Control. This is bad." Shadow stated. Shadow kept a watchful eye on all of his surroundings to make sure the Black Assassins would not sneak up on him.

Shadow heard a small sound from behind and quickly turned around shouting "CHAOS SPEAR!" Shadow sent only a single arrow and was lucky enough to hit the white armored assassin. With the death of the white armored assassin, that left only six more of them. "How am I supposed to beat them when they are using chaos control?" Shadow asked himself. Shadow was once again struck in the back and fell to the ground. When Shadow hit the ground, he felt something drop out of his fur and landed next to him. Shadow looked up and saw the purple chaos emerald.

"Of course. Fight fire with fire." Shadow said as he picked up the chaos emerald. Shadow stood up his feet and raised his chaos emerald into the air. "CHAOS CONTROL!" Shadow shouted. At that moment, the hidden Black Assassins were revealed to Shadow. "I got you now." Shadow said. Shadow changed into his ball form and used his spin dash to bash through the green armored assassin. With that one dead, that left only five more to go.

The Black Assassins fired their lasers at Shadow, but were avoided when he disappeared into thin air. The Black Assassin scanned the room for Shadow until the heard his voice coming from above them. "CHAOS SPEAR!" Shadow shouted. The assassins looked up at Shadow, who was in the air, before being killed by the barrage of yellow arrows. Shadow landed on his feet and dispelled the chaos control, seeing as how he won. Shadow smirked at his victory before disappearing in a flash of light.

* * *

Shadow then found himself in the center of the Black Comet, staring face to face with Black Doom. "You've done well, Shadow. I'm very impressed you've made it this far..." Black Doom said. "Black Doom! Your rule ends here, and it ends NOW!"Shadow souted "Fool! The Black Arms are more than superior... we are perfect! Do you really think you have any real chance of defeating us?!" Black Doom said. "It's you who should be scared, Black Doom. I made a promise to Maria to save the planet she loved so much... and I WILL!" Shadow shouted. "Then get ready to die! Let me show you the ultimate power in the universe!" Black Doom stated.

Shadow jumps onto Black Doom, but is swatted away like last time. Shadow felt weak again, but he couldn't let that stop him. Black Doom summoned five small meteors and shot them at Shadow. Shadow had surprisingly regained his strength and used his speed to avoid the meteors. Shadow was now hiding behind a rock, thinking of a way to fight Black Doom. "If he hits me, I lose my strength. How can I fight someone I can't touch?" Shadow asked himself. "You can't hide from me, Shadow." Black Doom said. Black Doom summoned a purple horizontal disk and shot it at Shadow's hiding spot.

Shadow quickly reacted and jumped up to avoid the attack. "You are a persistent little rodent." Black Doom said. Shadow jumped into the air and Shouted "CHAOS SPEAR!" Over a hundred arrows lunged themselves at Black Doom, but the evil alien created a shield that blocked the attack. "Now it is my turn." Black Doom said. Black Doom then summoned a red vertical disk and shot it at Shadow. Shadow avoided the disk, but did not notice the second red disk headed his way.

Shadow was hit directly in the back and sent flying back ten feet. Black Doom chuckled at Shadow as he laid there on the ground, severely beat and bruised. "I told you, Shadow. The Black Arms are perfect. We can not be defeated by the likes of you." Black Doom said. Shadow tried to talk back, but he was too weak to speak. "Don't worry, I won't kill you now. I will first give you the pleasure of watching your friends die in front of you." Black Doom said in a cruel manner.

Upon hearing what Black Doom had just said, something in Shadow's mind had snapped. "I will especially enjoy torturing that other hedgehog, Kumori. I will make sure she suffers in the most painful way possible." Black Doom continued, laughing cruelly. That was the last straw for Shadow. Shadow anger supplied him with enough strength to stand up and looked at Black Doom with eyes full of hate. "If you even lay a hand on Kumori, I'LL KILL YOU!!!" Shadow yelled in rage.

Black Doom was not intimidated by Shadow's threat and sent a punch to his face. But before it could even reach his face, Shadow grabbed Black Doom's by the wrist. "What?!" Black Doom yelled, surprised that Shadow actually caught his attack. Black Doom tried to free his arm from Shadow's grip, but failed miserably. Black Doom tried to punch Shadow with his other hand, but was caught just like the other one.

"You threatened to kill Kumori and I will make you pay." Shadow said. Red energy began to form around Shadow body as his rage increased. "What do you think you are doing?!" Black Doom yelled. It looked, that for the first time in Black Doom's eternal life, he was scared. "I told you Black Doom, your rule ends here, and it ends now!" Shadow yelled. Shadow's red glow was brighter then ever and finally released it on Black Doom.

"CHAOS BLAST!!!" Shadow yelled. The entire room was destroyed in a blast of red light. When the blast was finished, Shadow looked down to his feet and saw Black Doom's dead body. "It's finally over." Shadow said. Then, the six chaos emeralds that Black Doom held now floated above his head. The six emeralds were soon joined by the purple chaos emerald that Shadow possessed, meaning his search was finally over.

"Finally, I have all seven chaos emeralds. Now with them, I can find the answers to my origins." Shadow said with a satisfied smile on his face. Shadow looks down to Black Doom's dead body one last time. "And I will find them without you, Black Doom." Shadow said as he started to walk away. When Shadow left the room, Black Doom's hand twitch for a second before his third eye opened up. "Ha, ha, ha. Thank you, Shadow. Now, the Black Arms shall rule this world." Black Doom said

* * *

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	17. Origins Revealed

**SHADOW THE HEDGEHOG**

Disclaimer: I do not own the sonic characters, just the OC's

Chapter Seventeen: Origins Revealed

Shadow was walking down one of the many passageways of the Black Comet with the seven chaos emerald floating above his head. With Black Doom now dead, Shadow thought that the world was finally saved. Shadow stopped walking when he saw all his friends coming down the path. "Shadow!" Kumori yelled as she jumped him. When Kumori wrapped him in a hug, Shadow let out a small scream of pain. Kumori immediately released Shadow and saw scratches and bruises all over his body.

"Shadow, you're hurt." Kumori said. "I'm fine, now that Black Doom is dead." Shadow said. "You killed him?" Mach asked. "Yes and look what else I have." Shadow said as he pointed above his head. The group looked above his head and saw the seven chaos emeralds. "You have all seven." Sonic said. "Yes. And now I will discover the truth about my origins." Shadow said. But while Shadow was talking to the group, Knuckles, Tikal and Chaos were having their own private chat. "There is something strange about the emeralds." Tikal said. "Yeah, I feel it too." Knuckles said.

Then, to Shadow's surprise, Black Doom materialized in front of the entire group. "Black Doom? But how? I killed you." Shadow said. "You did not think you could defeat me with your insignificant power, did you?" Black Doom said. "What?" Shadow questioned. "I must thank you, Shadow. Because of you, I now possess all the chaos emeralds." Black Doom said. "What are you talking about? I have the chaos emeralds." Shadow said. Black Doom only chuckled and held an open hand out to the chaos emeralds. Black Doom sharply closed his hand towards the emeralds and when he did, all seven chaos emeralds were turned to dust.

"The emeralds are fake!" Tails exclaimed. "That's right. During our battle, I took your chaos emerald and replaced them with the false emeralds." Black Doom explained. The real chaos emeralds appeared from behind Black Dooms robe and floated above his head. "We won't allow you to destroy the planet, Black Doom!" Shadow exclaimed. "Ignorant fools... We're here to save the humans from their own demise. We offer... salvation." Black Doom said. "What?" Shadow questioned.

"Their greed, thirst for power, and affinity for betrayal has them on a path of self-destruction. Their actions will lead to extinction of their species. We're here to save them from themselves... with our perfect order... allowing them to live through their desperate lives in peace. Humans are a great energy source for us... they will be well-kept." Black Doom explained his intentions. "What?" everyone shouted. "Let us begin our ritual of prosperity. CHAOS... CONTROL!" Black Doom shouted.

* * *

Outside, in space, the Black Comet in enveloped in a green light and then disappears. The Black Comet was then teleported to the, once great, city of Westopolis. The Black Comet started to rumble before three large black tendrils emerged from it. The large tendrils plunge into the ground and connect to the Earth.

* * *

Back inside the Black Comet, the group was confused at what had just happened. "What was that? What just happened?" Cream asked. "Those black creatures just warped the Comet down to the surface using Chaos Control!" Sonic shouted. "So that's why he needed me to get the chaos emeralds." Shadow said as he fell to his knees, realizing what he had caused.

"Precisely. The Comet's velocity isn't powerful enough to pass through another planet's atmosphere. The Emeralds amplify the space-time control powers of Chaos Control. We need them to charge to full power. It's the perfect plan. That's why I needed the professor to help me." Black Doom explained. "What?" Shadow asked "That's insane." Eggman stated. The professor was in development of the ultimate life force, but he needed my help. So we made a deal... I helped him, and he promised to deliver me the seven Chaos Emeralds. That's how you were created, Shadow. You would help us do both! "Black Doom explained.

"Me? I can't believe it." Shadow said in disbelief. "That can't be! He betrayed his own people for research?! For Black Doom?!" Eggman questioned. "Big deal... we can't just stand here doing nothing." Sonic said. "Yeah, let's do this! I'll crush that cosmic rock ball!" Knuckles said as he raised his fist. Then suddenly, Knuckles felt his whole body stiffen. "Knuckles! What's wrong?!" Sonic asks. But his question was soon answer when him and everyone else was frozen in place.

A special weapon... this gas, once released, is quickly absorbed into your bloodstream. In a moment, total paralysis will hit your nervous system. The end is near, now...my dear offspring... Eat and devour these savory dishes!" Black Doom commanded as eleven black alien blobs moved towards the frozen heroes. The heroes tried to move but were unsuccessful. Meanwhile, several thoughts were clashing in Shadow's mind until he heard the voice of Maria. "Please help them, Shadow." Maria said. Shadow finally snapped out of his trance and realized what was happening.

"Hey! Stay away from me!" Rouge shouted to the blob in front of her. All eleven blobs suddenly jumped at their pray until Shadow called out "CHAOS SPEAR!" Exactly eleven arrows were conjured and killed the blobs in a single strike. "What?!" Black Doom shouted in surprise. Shadow got back to his feet and stared at Black Doom with eyes of determination. "I've left the past behind me. No one can tell me what to do now! I will destroy you, Black Doom!" Shadow shouted.

"I gave you life, and THIS is how you repay me? The irony of it all, is I gave you life... now... I'll take it back!" Black Doom stated. Black Doom turns and starts to float away. Shadow quickly followed Black Doom, not planning on losing him. "Shadow." Kumori quietly said. "He's our only hope now. "Sonic said.

* * *

Shadow ran down the same passageway he came from, knowing Black Doom would be at the center of the comet again. His progress was soon halted when over ten Black Oaks appeared out of nowhere and blocked his path. "I don't have time for you." Shadow said as he charged at the large aliens. Then suddenly, Shadow was hit by a laser to the leg and fell to the ground. Shadow got back to his feet and looked back to see what caused the attack. When he looked back, he saw every type of Black Arms alien from the Black Warrior to the Black Assassin surrounded him. "Damn." Shadow swore

The Black assassin fired its laser at Shadow, but was avoided. But when Shadow avoided the attack, he was slashed in the back by one of the Black Warriors. Shadow turned around as the Black Warrior tried to strike again, but Shadow jumped out of the way. But when he jumped away, a laser hit Shadow in his shoulder. Every time Shadow tried to avoid an attack, he was attacked from another direction until he couldn't take anymore. Shadow finally collapsed to the ground.

How am I going to get out of this?" Shadow asked himself. As the Black Arms drew closer, Shadow stared at his power ring and remembered the time it saved hi life on the ARK. "I did it once, I can do it again." Shadow thought. Shadow released both power rings from his cuffs and clutched them in his hands. The Black Arms jumped on Shadow as he shouted "CHAOS CONTROL!" Shadow disappeared before he was crushed.

* * *

Shadow appeared in the center of the comet where Black Doom was waiting for him. "Well done, Shadow. You've gone farther than I expected... I'm impressed!" Black Doom said as Shadow walked closer to him. "But you still don't understand, do you? The future we offer is the only option for these humans." Black Doom continued. "I've heard enough. You're boring me to death, Black Doom! You're going down!!" Shadow states. Black Doom only laughs.

"Such bravado for a little hedgehog. I thought you were different from the rest... but maybe not. We are more alike than you think... the same blood runs through our veins." Black Doom said. Black raised his hand towards Shadow, who was now clutching his head in pain. "This can't be...!" Shadow said as he fell to his knees. "Just... who are you?" Shadow asked weakly. "Don't you know? You were created from MY blood." Black Doom says "What?!" Shadow questions. That's right. You are a part of me... do you feel that? I can control you. You cannot escape me... nor can you escape your past!" Black Doom says. "Damn you! NO! It's not true...!" Shadow shouts desperately.

* * *

Back at the ARK's research facility, Espio was trying to hack the computers data with Charmy and Vector watching. They already hacked into G.U.N. and Eggman's files, but did not find what they were looking for. "Espio, are you in yet?" Charmy asked. Vector covers Charmy's mouth to shut him up. "Quiet, Charmy. Espio, we need you to focus 'cuz if we don't hurry all the data we recovered will be lost!" Vector said. "Easier said than done... who signed me up for this anyway?" Espio replied.

Charmy breaks out of Vectors hold and flies above their head. "I'll do it. Get out of the way." Charmy said. "Get back here, you idiot!" Vector yells, but it was too late. Charmy rams into the computer and a recording of Professor Gerald activates. "Hey, it's working!" Team Chaotix shouts in surprise.

* * *

Back at the Black Comet, Shadow was about to admit defeat until he heard his creators voice. "Shadow, my son." "Professor?" Shadow questioned. Then, small monitors with Professor Gerald on them appear before Shadow and Black Doom. "What is this?" Black Dom asked. ""If you're listening to this, then the worst has happened...you need to know the truth. The government plans to shutdown this research facility..."The recording said.

* * *

The message was not only being heard on the Black Comet, but the entire world as well. At G.U.N. base, the president and commander were watching the recording. "The government plans to cease all of our research... and imprison all who know about you. I made a terrible mistake, Shadow... It's all my fault... making contact with that Comet..." the recording said. "Professor Gerald?" the commander questioned. "Now listen carefully." The recording continued.

* * *

Back with the frozen heroes, they were also listening to Gerald's recording. ""In fifty years, the Black Comet will return... They plan to harness its powers to destroy this planet! The only way to stop them... was to develop a way to use the very power THEY intended to use AGAINST them." The recording said. "Of course, it's brilliant!" Eggman said, realizing his grandfather's plan.

* * *

Back with Shadow and Black Doom, the recording was finishing up. ""Shadow... it's up to you and only you can stop them! I developed the Eclipse Cannon... It's the only weapon that can destroy that Black Comet. Shadow, you are the only hope to save mankind as we know it... The future of this planet depends on... you!" the recording said. In the recording, Maria was seen walking up to her grandfather.

"Don't worry, grandfather. Shadow and I will protect this planet. Right, Shadow?" Maria said. Black Doom chuckled at Professor Gerald's plans. Gerald, you fool! Shadow is already in my control...What's this?!" Black shouted in surprise as Shadow broke out of Black Doom's control and stood up. "Well, well, well... seems like you're immune to my mind control." Black Doom said. You have no control over me, Black Doom. I now understand why I am here. I made a promise and I'm here to keep it. Today, I put my past behind me." Shadow said.

* * *

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	18. Who I Am

**SHADOW THE HEDGEHOG**

Disclaimer: I do not own the sonic characters, just the OC's

Chapter Eighteen: Who I Am

"Today, I put my past behind me." Shadow said. Black Doom laughs again at Shadow's proclamation of putting his past behind him. "You don't understand, Shadow. You can't escape your past. Because, I am your past." Black Doom said. "Not for long." Shadow said. Shadow changed into his ball form and uses a spin dash on Black Doom. Black Doom tried to conjure a shield to protect him, but the black hedgehog was too fast for him. Shadow's spin dash sent him straight through Black Doom's chest.

Shadow changed back to his regular form and looked back to see Black Doom fall over, dead. Just to make sure he was really dead, Shadow walked over and kicked Black Doom's head. "Looks like I'm finally rid of you. Now I can truly put my past behind me." Shadow said as he started to walk away. Just as he was about to leave the room, he heard Black Doom's voice coming from behind. "Well done, Shadow."

Shadow looked back to see that Black Doom was still dead on the ground. "This whole Black Arms thing must be getting to my head." Shadow said to himself. "I wouldn't be too sure of that, Shadow." Black Doom's voice came from above. Shadow looked up to see Doom's Eye floating only a few feet above him. "You have proven to be a much greater hazard to me then I had originally thought you to be." Black Doom's voice came from the eye.

Shadow was very confused at this point. Shadow had just killed Black Doom, yet he is still speaking through his eye. "How is that possible? I killed Black Doom. So how can you still be talking for him? Unless..." Shadow trailed off as he realized the truth. "Unless he was not the real Black Doom." The Doom's Eye finished for him. "But, that means..." Shadow trailed off again. "That's right, Shadow. I am the real Black Doom." The Doom's Eye, revealed to Black Doom, said.

"But, if you're Black Doom, then who did I just defeat?" Shadow asked. "What you have defeated was nothing more then a worthless puppet under my control." Black Doom said. For a second, Shadow stared in shock before letting out a loud laugh. "What is so funny?" Black Doom asked. "It's funny that the thing I have feared all this time was just a one-eyed squid." Shadow said. "You can still redeem yourself, Shadow. Join me and we will rule this world together." Black Doom offered.

"I already told you, Black Doom. You have no control over me. Today, you die." Shadow said. "Have it your way, Shadow. So be it... be prepared to meet your maker. Your past, present, and future ends here... today! Prepare to die! Say "Goodbye", Shadow, as you witness my true wrath!" Black Doom shouted as he floated off to the higher reaches of the comet.

Shadow once again held all seven chaos emeralds and knew what had to be done. "Black Doom. You have invaded my home and took the live of many people. Now it's time for you to pay for your actions!" Shadow said. Shadow closed his eyes as the seven chaos emeralds satrted to spin around him. Shadow absorbed all the positive energies of the emerald until he transformed into Super Shadow. Now that he had successfully transformed, Shadow flew off to face Black Doom.

* * *

Shadow broke through the Black Comet and found himself flying outside in Westopolis. "Come out, Black Doom! I am going to blast you straight to Hell!" Shadow shouted. "Too late, Shadow. We are already in Hell. MY Hell." Black Doom's voice echoed through the city. From the Black Comet, a new monster began to form. The monster looked like a double sided gargoyle with it bottom half connected to the Black Comet. The real Black Doom was seen hovering above the monster before become the new monster's eye.

"I gave you life, and yet you defy me? So be it! You shall pay for your ingratitude with relentless pain! Feel the wrath of Devil Doom!" Black Doom shouted. "We'll just see about that, monster." Shadow said. Shadow charged at Devil Doom, but was stopped when he crashed into a large meteor. "What the?" Shadow questioned. "Ha, ha, ha. I told you, Shadow. This is the true extent of my power! This is the true wrath of the Black Arms!" Black Doom shouted.

Devil Doom moved its hand towards Shadow and the meteors flew straight at his direction. Shadow easily avoided the attack and flew at Devil Doom. Shadow knew that Devil Doom was just another puppet, so he aimed to hit Black Doom himself. As he was about to deliver a deadly punch to Black Doom, Shadow was hit by a laser and sent flying twenty feet away. Shadow looked at Devil Doom and saw numerous meteors surround him and started to glow yellow.

"Fire!" Black Doom shouted. The yellow glowing meteors then all fired large lasers at the golden hedgehog. Shadow used the speed he had been given to avoid the lasers the best he could. After avoiding a barrage of lasers, Shadow decided to fight back with his own attack. "CHAOS SPEAR!" Shadow yelled. Numerous yellow arrows were sent flying and destroyed each and every one of the meteors. One of the arrows was also able strike at Black Doom. Devil Doom screeched in pain as Black Doom left the monsters skull.

Black Doom then entered into the head on the side. The other head turned around to face Shadow. "I am very impressed that you made it this far, Shadow. But this game must come to an end." Black Doom said. "For once we agree on something." Shadow said. "Indeed. CHAOS CONTROL!" Black Doom shouted as he and Devil Doom disappeared into thin air. Shadow searched frantically for Black Doom, for he did not realize that he could use chaos control.

"It ends now." Black Doom's voice came from behind. Shadow looked back before being swatted away by Devil Doom. Devil Doom used chaos control again to teleport Behind Shadow and swat him away to a new direction. This continued as Devil Doom kept using chaos control to hit Shadow from behind before he has a chance to react. Finally, Devil Doom used chaos control one last time to get behind Shadow and grab his body tightly with both hands. "It's over! I win, Shadow!" Black Doom boasted as Devil Doom started to squeeze the life out of Shadow.

Shadow thought it was over until he started to hear the voices of his friends in his head.

SONIC: "Come on, Shadow! Your supposed to be the ultimate life-form."

TIKAL: "We believe in you, Shadow!"

ROUGE: "Shadow! We're counting on you!"

MACH: "Don't let that freak win!"

TAILS: "You the only one that can stop him!"

KNUCKLES: "You're too strong to lose to the likes of him!"

CREAM: "You can do it, Shadow!"

EGGMAN: "Show that thing your true power!

He thought they weren't there, he could hear his friends. He could hear them cheering him on to defeat Black Doom once and for all. With each person cheering, Shadow felt himself become even more powerful. It was the last voice that had finally set him off. "Go for it, Shadow!" Kumori yelled. That was it, Shadow was finally was ready for the final blow. His golden body began to change bright red in Devil Doom's hands. "What is happening?!" Black Doom questioned.

"SUPER...CHAOS...BLAST!!!" Shadow shouted. The red energy released itself upon Devil Doom as its body was completely destroyed in the atomic blast. Shadow managed to suppress enough of his power to prevent the blast from destroying the Black Comet. Before Shadow released the blast, Black Doom escaped from the body. Unfortunately for him, Shadow appeared from behind and grabbed him by his tentacles. Shadow then plunged downwards towards the Black Comet with Black Doom held in front of him.

Seconds later, Black Doom and Super Shadow crashed from the roof the comet and hit hard into the ground. Black Doom was greatly injured and Super Shadow was standing in front of him without a scratch. "Im...impossible! I am the Supreme Being that rules this universe! I am the immortal life-form! I am the ultimate power!" Black Doom shouted. "Not anymore." Shadow said. "Just who do you think you are?" Black Doom questioned.

Shadow said nothing at that moment as he looked at his hands. "I once asked myself that same question. But thanks to you, I now know." Shadow said. "What?!" Black Doom said. "I am Shadow the Hedgehog. I was created for one purpose and one purpose only. To protect the world from evil creatures like you. I am and will always be the Earth's eternal guardian. This is who I am!" Shadow proclaimed "Do you really believe that?" Black Doom asked. "Yes, I do. And now to finish what I started. CHAOS CONTROL!" Shadow shouted before disappearing. Along with him, all the other heroes disappeared as well.

* * *

Outside, the group of heroes land on the streets. "What happened?" Rouge asked. "I think Shadow used chaos control to save us from that comet." Knuckles said. "But, where is Shadow?" Cream asked. The others also noticed that Shadow was not with them and scanned the area. The search was stopped when Rouge yelled "Look! Up there!" and pointed to the comet.

Shadow was standing on top of the comet and prepared to deliver the final blow. "Only one thing left to do. To put the past behind me." Shadow said. Shadow jumped off the Black Comet and flew to the bottom of it. He held the comet over his head, ready to move it. "Welcome to MY Hell, Black Doom. CHAOS CONTROL!" Shadow yelled. And in a golden ray of light, Shadow and the Black Comet disappeared.

* * *

Out in space, the Black Comet reappears beneath the ARK. The large tower of the ARK opens up and charges its energy. Instead of the normal green, the Eclipse Cannon fired a gold beam and destroyed the Black Comet and everyone on it. That included Black Doom.

* * *

All around the Earth, people were celebrating the end of the Black Arms. "Alright, he did it." Sonic shouted in joy. "I knew he would." Tails said. "I wonder if he is alright." Kumori said out loud. "Don't worry. He IS Shadow after all." Mach reassured her. But while everyone was celebrating, Eggman was trying to sneak away. "Now how about giving me those chaos emeralds." Eggman said. "Hey! Get back here you creep!" Knuckles yelled. Eggman was chased by Knuckles, Tikal and Chaos while the others were laughing.

* * *

At G.U.N. base, everyone was cheering and celebrating over the victory. "How ironic... After the way we all treated him, he saved us all in the end. We were all wrong about the professor. Let us pay homage to Professor Gerald. Let's work to ensure peace and prosperity for a brighter future! What do you say, Commander?" the president asked. "That is a great idea, sir." The commander said.

* * *

Shadow was onboard the ARK, looking at an old picture of Gerald and Maria. "Good bye forever...Shadow the Hedgehog." Shadow says quietly. Shadow walks away and tosses the picture, leaving his past behind.

* * *

In a place of molten lava and burning ash, Black Doom finds himself awakening in this unknown place. "Where am I?" Black Doom asked. "You're in Hell, Black Doom." A dark voice echoed. Just then, a black hole appeared before Black Doom and a new figure appeared from it. His face was covered in shadows and the only thing you could see about him was the pulsating blue aura around him. It was the same person that was released by the chaos emeralds over a month ago.

"What do you mean?" Black Doom asked. "You're dead. Shadow killed you." the mysterious person put it simply. "Shadow! If I wasn't dead, I would kill him!" Black Shouted in rage. "I can help you with that." The person said. "What?" Black Doom asked. "If you promise to serve me for all of eternity, I can bring you back to life and help you get revenge on the one that killed you." the person offered. Black Doom hesitated at first, but soon agreed. "I promise to serve you forever. I swear I will get my revenge on you, Shadow the Hedgehog!" Black Doom yelled.

* * *

**I Am... All of Me**

I see no, hear no evil  
Black writing's on the wall  
Unleashed a million faces  
And one-by-one they fall

Black-hearted evil, or  
Brave-hearted hero  
I am all, I am all, I am

I... I... I... I am  
Here we go, buddy, here we go, buddy  
Here we go, here we go, buddy, here we go

Go ahead and try to see through me  
Do it if you dare  
One step forward, two steps back, I'm here  
One step forward, two steps back

Do it! Do it! Do it! Do it!

Can you see all of me?  
Walk into my mystery  
Step inside, and hold on for dear life

Do you remember me?  
Capture you or set you free  
I am all, and I am all of me  
I am, I am all of me

I am, I am, I'm all of me  
I am, I am, I'm all of me  
I am, I am, I'm all of me  
Here we go

I see and feel the evil  
My hands will crush 'em all  
You think you have the answers  
I'll laugh and watch you fall

Black-hearted evil, or  
Brave-hearted hero  
I am all, I am all, I am

I... I... I... I am  
Here we go, buddy, here we go, buddy  
Here we go, here we go, buddy, here we go

Go ahead and try to see through me  
Do it if you dare  
One step forward, two steps back, I'm here  
One step forward, two steps back

Do it! Do it! Do it! Do it!

Can you see all of me?  
Walk into my mystery  
Step inside, and hold on for dear life

Do you remember me?  
Capture you or set you free  
I am all, and I am all of me  
I am, I am all of me

I am, I am, I'm all of me  
I am, I am, I'm all of me  
I am, I am, I'm all of me  
Here we go

I am, I am everyone, everywhere  
Anyhow, anyway, any will, anyday  
I am, I am everyone, everywhere  
Anyhow, anyway, any will, anyday

I am, I am, I am  
I am, I am, I am, I am

Do it! Do it! Do it! Do it!

Can you see all of me?  
Walk into my mystery  
Step inside, and hold on for dear life

Do you remember me?  
Capture you or set you free  
I am all, and I am all of me  
I am, I am all of me

I am, I am, I'm all of me  
I am, I am, I'm all of me  
I am, I am, I'm all of me  
Here we go  
I am, I am, I'm all of me  
Here we go

I am, I am all of me

* * *

**Please, read and review.**


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